Punjab senior BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia on Sunday asked the senior party colleague and Himachal Pradesh’s former Chief Minister Shanta Kumar why he had not raised his voice on the appointment of Chief Parliamentary Secretaries when he was the State BJP in-charge.
Stressing that Kumar was the BJP State-in-charge when the SAD-BJP alliance was formed Government in the State, Kalia asked why Kumar did not oppose the appointments if they were wrong.
The Punjab and Haryana High Court had recently quashed the appointment of 18 CPS by the Prakash Singh Badal Government in April 2012, terming it “unconstitutional”.
Kumar had recently written an article in a vernacular daily criticising the appointments of CPS.
Kalia alleged that between 1990 and 1992, Kumar, as Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister, had appointed CPS apart from 12 ministers. He minced no words to accuse former Union Cabinet Minister Kumar for shedding ‘crocodile tears’ on the issue of appointment of CPSs.
In a letter written in Hindi, Kalia stated that Shanta, who has overwhelmingly welcomed the quashing of 18 CPS in Punjab, was in-charge of BJP’s affairs in Punjab in 2011, when Chief Parliament Secretaries were appointed in Punjab. Why Shanta did not object on such appointsIJ, Kalia quipped.
Few months back also Kalia threw a "letter bomb" on Shanta Kumar by levelling corruption charges against former Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister.