Punjab Congress on Tuesday sought an explanation from Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal over displacement of members of Sikh community, mainly agriculturists, living in Kutch area of Gujarat by the State Government led by BJP — the political ally of SAD.
Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) president Partap Singh Bajwa, addressing a party workers’ meeting, said that anti-minority community mindset of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi was exposed once again where he hounded Sikhs and told them to sell their land and go back to Punjab. Describing the political alliance between SAD and BJP as “opportunist” and “driven by business interests of Badal family”, Bajwa said that SAD was neither representative party of Sikhs nor it has any political philosophy and farsightedness.
Bajwa cited the report by National Commission for Minorities (NCM) stated that Narendra Modi-led Gujarat government had prima facie discriminated against state’s 50,000-member Sikh community in Kutch by ordering them to sell their land and return to Punjab because they were not ‘Gujaratis’, citing the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural lands Act, 1948.
He added that the Commission has strongly disapproved of Gujarat government’s interpretation that only Gujarati farmers could own or buy land in the state under the Act. The Gujarat Government had already frozen their land accounts.
PPCC chief pointed out that Gujarat High Court had struck down unanimously Gujarat government’s this order, but the state government had now challenged this verdict in the Supreme Court.
“Badal is keeping complete mum on the protecting rights of Sikhs in Gujarat. A deputation of Sikhs from Gujarat had also met Badal but they failed to get any assurance. Badal could have used his political clout in BJP to withdraw legal proceedings against Sikh farmers in larger national interests,” he added. PNS