Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday asked Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh to either quit as the Chief Minister or transfer the Amritsar Improvement Trust case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for probe outside Punjab. 

The party maintained that the rejection of the state Vigilance Bureau’s cancellation report in the Amritsar Improvement Trust scam case involving Capt Amarinder, by the Mohali special court Judge Jaswinder Singh on August 24 calls for “impartial, transparent and fair trial”. 

“A free and fair trial is now highly impossible if Capt Amarinder continues to be the Chief Minister-cum-Home Minister controlling the prosecution as well as the Vigilance Bureau of the state,” said AAP MlA and the leader of Opposition in Vidhan Sabha Sukhpal Singh Khaira. 

Khaira said that while rejecting VB’s cancellation report, the court had held that the said report was based on ‘surmises and conjectures', in other words the Judge has clearly indicated that it is befitting case of corruption which needs further investigation. 

This is clear prima-facie indict of Capt Amarinder on corruption charges, by the court of law, he added. 

Khaira expressed surprise that it was the then treasury benches led by Parkash Singh Badal that got Capt Amarinder expelled as MlA on the basis of a Vidhan Sabha committee report, indicting him in the infamous Amritsar Trust scam. 

Few years later, it was the same Badal controlled VB that filed the said cancellation report on October 4, 2016, giving Capt Amarinder a clean chit, he said adding that it only show that the Badals then and Capt Amarinder now are “misusing the criminal justice system of Punjab to arm twist each other and then settle matters behind the curtains”. 

He said that the game of witch-hunt and then compromise has been going on between Capt Amarinder and Badal family since 2002, when the first case of corruption and disproportionate assets was registered against the Badal family. 

“Keeping in view of dubious track record of the prosecution machinery and the Vigilance Bureau particularly with Capt Amarinder being the Chief Minister, there is no chance for a fair and judicious trial in either the Amritsar Improvement Trust scam and in ludhiana City Centre scandal fixed for September 2, to consider the cancellation report filed by VB,” said Khaira. 

“This is nothing but travesty, murder and rape of criminal justice system of Punjab to ensure self-motivated, pre-mediated and manipulated acquittal by Capt Amarinder,” he said while urging Capt Amarinder to either quit as Punjab Chief Minister or unilaterally hand over investigations and trials of both corruption cases of Amritsar and ludhiana to the CBI for trial outside the state of Punjab.