Punjab Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema on Wednesday claimed that the state’s financial condition during the previous Congress regime was precarious and the Government was in overdraft thrice.

“And during the past three months in AAP Government, there was not a single occasion when Punjab was in over draft,” claimed Cheema while responding to the issues raised by the opposition members during the debate on the budget proposals for 2022-23.

Citing figures, Cheema said that Punjab was in overdraft for 100 days in 2017-18, for 63 days in 2018-19, and for 47 days in 2019-20. “During this, the employees were not given their salaries and the state remained in a sort of financial emergency,” he said.

Cheema maintained that the state has the borrowing limit of Rs 55,000 crores for the next oen year. “Despite this, we have decided that we would not take a loan of more than Rs 35,000 crores,” he said while adding that during this time, we would also repay the loans of Rs 36,000 crore. He claimed that with better fiscal management, the Punjab Government would be able to repay its previous loans within the next one year.

On the opposition’s allegations against AAP Government of taking huge loans during its three-month tenure, Cheema made it clear that the Punjab Government took a loan of Rs 8,000 crores till date, while repaying the debt of Rs 10,500 crores, which is Rs 2500 crores more than the loan taken.

Taking on the previous Congress government, Cheema said that a loan of Rs 42,386 crore and Rs 41,083 crore were taken in 2020-21 and 2021-22, respectively.

Cheema claimed that Punjab is rapidly moving towards becoming financially prosperous after coming out of the financial crisis. “And because of this, the government is working vigorously to restore the old pension scheme for the employees and to implement the Pay Commission’s recommendations to pay the salaries and pensions to the professors posted in the state’s colleges as per the UGC’s recommendations,” he said.