Before the oath ceremony, seven Congress MLAs including Sukhpal Khaira questioned the Punjab Congress president on the inclusion Rana Gurjeet Singh. But Sidhu has been silent.
Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi along with Deputy CM Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and PPCC President Navjot Singh Sidhu pay tribute at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021. Photo: PTI
Chandigarh: Navjot Singh Sidhu, who has emerged as the new power house in Punjab Congress after the exit of Captain Amarinder Singh, once commented that punishing a wrongdoer is not vendetta but justice. Separately, he had also stated that he would fight corruption without fear.
The fact that Sidhu has selected a ‘tainted’ party leader to be among the 15 who took the oath as ministers of new cabinet of chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi has not gone down well in the party.
Hours before the induction ceremony, as many as seven party MLAs, including Sidhu’s predecessor Mohinder Singh Kaypee, wrote to him demanding that Rana Gurjeet Singh be dropped as he was known as a corrupt face in the Doaba region.
Channi who identified himself as an “aam aadmi” and in his recent address announced that either he will remain or corruption, was sent a similar letter by these seven MLAs.
But their request seems to have gone unheard.
In the letter, the MLAs stated that public and Congress cadre alike are unhappy with the inclusion of Rana Gurjeet Singh. Rana Gurjeet had been dropped from the cabinet of former chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh in January 2018 due to the infamous mining scandal involving him, his family and his companies.
The letter further stated that the Punjab government had forfeited approximately Rs 25 crore deposited by Rana Gurjeet’s ‘front company’, Rajbir Enterprises, during the auction of three mining sites in Punjab.
“Justice Narang Commission that probed the minister, brought out a startling fact that the front company of Rana Gurjeet Singh had received Rs 5 crore gratification/contribution for the said mining auction from Rs 2000 crore irrigation scamster Gurinder Singh Bhapa charged by Vigilance Bureau and now in custody,” the letter added.
A photo tweeted by ANI of Rana Gurjeet Singh’s oath taking. Photo: Twitter/@ANI
“We wonder why Rana Gurjeet Singh is included in the cabinet as he was dropped in January 2018 because of above charges and has got no clean chit from any court or the government,” MLAs further pressed, asking Sidhu and Channi to include a ‘clean’ face instead.
The MLAs also wrote that it was amusing that all three ministers proposed to be included in the cabinet from Doaba region are Jat Sikhs and that there is only one minister from the Other Backward Classes when the Dalit population in the region is approximately 38%.
Apart from Mohinder Singh Kaypee, the MLAs supported the letter were Navtej Singh Cheema (Sultanpur), Balwinder Singh Dhaliwal (Phagwara), Bawa Henry (Jalandhar North), Dr Raj Kumar (Chabewal), Pawan Aditya (Sham Chaurasi) and Sukhpal Singh Khaira (Bholath).
Party blunder, says Khaira
Khaira, who even met Sidhu in Patiala and requested him to drop Rana Gurjeet before the induction ceremony at Punjab governor house on Sunday evening, said that the party has committed a blunder by inducting him into the cabinet while he is still facing charges of illegal mining and the Enforcement Directorate is still investigating him.
“I don’t know why the party has taken the decision but it is quite an unpopular one. It will have a negative impact as the elections are around the corner,” Khaira told The Wire.
He continued, “We have no personal fight against him (Rana Gurjeet). But the decision to induct him will stand out as a wrong one because allegations of the mining scandal continue to stick to him. Our fight will continue. We will step up our campaign and if need be, we will also go to Delhi,” he said
‘Humiliated,’ say dropped ministers
As many as five ministers in Amarinder Singh’s old cabinet, who are also his close aides – Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi, Balbir Sidhu, Gurpreet Singh Kangar, Sunder Sham Arora and Sadhu Singh Dharamsot – have been dropped.
Two of them – Balbir Singh Sidhu and Gurpreet Singh Kangar – held a joint news conference here shortly before the cabinet expansion, asking why they had been dropped.
Balbir Sidhu even broke down asking what his “fault” was. Kangar, too, asked the same question.
‘I am a soldier of Sonia Gandhi. They should have asked for my resignation and I would have given it happily. People in my area are disappointed. I am not upset with losing my ministry, I have no greed for power. But I want to ask what was the need to humiliate us?” Balbir said.
He said he had made himself available round-the-clock when the pandemic was at its peak and that he and his entire family had contracted COVID-19.
Kangar said that when he held the power department portfolio, he would attend to complaints related to power even late in the night and try to resolve them fast.
When he held the revenue department, Kangar said, he digitised the records.
Meanwhile, seven new faces who took oath were working president Sangat Singh Gilzian, Amrinder Singh Raja Warring, Punjab Pradesh Congress general secretary Pargat Singh, Dr Raj Kumar Veraka, Rana Gurjit Sodhi and former chief minister Beant Singh’s grandson, Gurkirat Singh Kotli.
The names who have been retained from the old cabinet are Brahm Mohindra, Manpreet Badal, Sukhbinder Sarkaria, Tripat Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Vijay Inder Singla, Aruna Chaudhary, Razia Sultana and Bharat Bhushan Ashu.
source ; the wire
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