Sidhu challenges Badal for open debate

Wednesday 09th August 2017 07:00 EDT
 

Jalandhar: Local bodies minister Navjot Singh Sidhu during a visit to Seechewal to see the working of sewage treatment plant targeted the Badal family. He called the former chief minister, Parkash Singh Badal, a ‘python’. He said, “Badal has swallowed the state’s glory and minted money through cable mafia, transport mafia, benami (unaccounted) properties during his 10-year regime.”

Citing example of ‘Ali Baba and Chalis Chor’ (40 thieves) Sidhu said, “Badal and his family has looted the state and now they are trying to malign my image with fake allegations.” Badals should talk to me face-to-face instead of issuing statements against me, he said. “I challenge Parkash Singh Badal for an open debate. If he does not have time I can even go to his village for it,” Sidhu said.

“Their sins cannot be washed overnight, so the Captain Amarinder Singh led government is working overnight to put the state’s economy back on track,” he said. He also lashed at the Badals on the Fastway and said that he has forwarded the proposal file to the chief minister.

“It will be approved in the next House meeting after getting clearance from legal branch, in the coming two weeks,” he said. “We are not going to leave the Fastway. Direct to home (DTH) services are paying 10% tax but Fastway paid a negligible amount under Badal regime. Tax will be imposed on them. It will help us to reach their unreported cable connection network,” he said.

Responding to Bikram Majithia’s remark during Jabar Virodhi Lehar in Batala, Sidhu said that Sukhbir Badal’s brother-in-law Majithia is suffering from ‘oral diarrhoea’ and cannot refrain from uttering nonsense. Meanwhile, lauding the role of environmentalist Sant Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal for water conservation and tree plantation, he said his efforts need to be replicated for making 65 state sewage treatment plants functional effectively.

“Akalis wasted more than £60 million in the name of STPs whereas Baba Seechewal performed this miracle with merely Rs 1200,000,” he said.


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