Expressing its deep anguish over the failure of the preceding governments in Punjab to take on the rising incidents of deaths due to farm distress and the youths dying of drug overdose, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday castigated the “sleepy” governments for confounding the problem.
“If official figures are to be believed, Punjab is passing through a critical phase with the overstressed farmers, already in debt trap, being shoved into taking the extreme step due to government’s apathetic attitude, peddling rosy dreams of a complete loan waiver, only to backtrack on the promise, leaving the hassled farmers to fend for themselves,” said AAP MLAs — Kultar Singh Sandhwan (Kotkapura) and Prof Baljinder Kaur (Talwandi Sabo).
Sandhwan, also AAP’s state unit Kisan wing chief, said that the government should, taking a cue from the Delhi Government, should implement the recommendations of Swaminathan Commission to address the farm distress.
They said that the government in the saddle, like the previous Akali Dal government, had failed on all fronts, be it creating enough job opportunities under the ‘Ghar Ghar Naukari’, addressing the issues and concerns of farmers, stamping out the menace of drugs, which had proved to be a mere ‘jumla’ as nothing came about out of the narrative.
Speaking about the drugs menace, Sandhwan accused the former SAD-BJP government of shoving the youth into drugs by offering a protective cover to the drug lords. “It is the Akali Dal government which introduced the cult of ‘mafia raj’ in the state. Even the ruling Congress government has done nothing,” he added.
Prof Baljinder Kaur said that the galloping pace at which deaths due to drug overdose by the youths were taking place had sounded a clarion for the deaf dispensation. “What is more worrying is that the drugs has spread its fangs over the younger girls both in the urban and rural pockets of the state for which the governments were to be held solely responsible,” she added while citing a recent example of a 13-year-old girl from Rama Mandi in Bathinda district who was allegedly shoved into drugs by her seniors.
She said that the situation was for more alarming in the border districts of Gurdaspur, Ferozepur and Tarn Taran, where three youths had recently died of drug overdose.