Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Monday staged a protest rally at Mohali on agrarian crises in Punjab and the alleged multi-crore foodgrain scam in the State. Despite blockades by the police, AAP volunteers reached Mohali in scorching heat and braved the 40 degrees plus temperature for hours to show the strength of the party.
The AAP activists, however, could not ‘gherao’ Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badals residence, as the rally was stopped at the Chandigarh border, where heavy arrangements of police deployment was made.
All the senior leaders of Punjab unit of AAP, including Punjab affairs in-ncharge Sanjay Singh and State Convenor Sucha Singh Chottepur and Sangrur MP Bhagwant Mann, Prof Sadhu Singh, Sukhpal Khaira, Gurpreet Ghuggi, Prof Balwinder Kaur etc reached in the protest rally.
After holding the rally at Dashehra Ground in Mohali, the rally moved towards Chandigarh around 12.30 noon, to be stopped at YPS Chowk, where heavy police deployment and barricading was done.
The protest march stopped at YPS chowk only and AAP leaders including Sanjay Singh, Suchha Singh Chhotepur, Bhagwant Mann, Prof Balwinder Kaur, Himmat Singh Shergill etc. were taken to Governor House and Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal’s residence by the authorities.
Chief Minister Badal had on Sunday declared to cancel all his engagements in the wake of the rally and had invited the AAP leaders to his residence. He received a copy of the Memorandum from AAP outside his residence as the AAP leaders refuse to enter his residence, and sat on a dharna outside his house.
Sanjay Singh alleged that the Punjab Government had tried to exercise all its power to male the protest a failure by stopping thousands of buses and vehicles on the way but they could not succeed. Having handed over the memorandum, Singh said that Badal has assured them of addressing all their grievances, put forth in the memorandum in a weeks’ time.
In the memorandum given to Kaptaan Singh Solanki, Governor of Punjab and Haryana, and Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, AAP has demanded Supreme Court monitored SIT probe in the alleged shortage of stock of Rs12,000 crore in the godowns of Punjab.
It also demanded action against Revenue Minister Bikram Singh Majithia for his alleged involvement in drug racket.
Making a major demand for suicide victim families, AAP has demanded compensation of Rs15 lakhs for each farmer family, victim of agrarian crises in the State. AAP has also demanded that each case of bad loan should be considered sympathetically and their loan should be rescheduled depending on the payment capacity of the farmers. AAP has once again raised the issue of pesticide scam and holding Tota Singh Agriculture Minister of Punjab, responsible for failure of cotton crop in 2015, has demanded action against him.
Timely payment of wheat crops, Judicial probe into the alleged 4500 crores scam in Public Distribution department, proper installation of RO systems in cancer affected areas like Bathinda, Ferozpur and Fazilka, etc. are other demands included in the memorandum.