Undeterred by the criticism by his own men over his action against illegal constructions, senior Congress leader and Punjab local Government Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu on Wednesday stick to his tough stand while giving Jalandhar mayor 15-day time to set his house in order on the issue.
The Minister made it clear that the Department was checking up the cases of illegal constructions in the unauthorized colonies and “not on the colonies for the poor”.
“No houses of the poor are being demolished,” he clarified after the meeting with the irked party leaders including — Jalandhar MP Chaudhary Santokh Singh, Jalandhar North MlA Avtar Bawa Henry, Jalandhar Central MlA Rajinder Beri, and Jalandhar Mayor Jagdish Raja. Jalandhar Cantonment MlA Pargat Singh was also present in the meeting.
Jalandhar West MlA Sushil Kumar Rinku, who was the first one to protest against Sidhu’s orders of demolition of illegal buildings, stayed away from the meeting and instead met the Jalandhar Deputy Commissioner.
Sidhu’s unrelenting tough stand and the meeting with irked MlAs came a day after Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh also backed his local Government Minister’s action against illegal colonies.
Chief Minister had declared that nobody would be allowed to carry out illegal constructions just to benefit from the State Government’s proposed regularization policy on unauthorized colonies.
Sidhu had cracked whip over the illegal construction in Jalandhar past week while ordering suspension of eight officials of the building branch of the Municipal Corporation — an action that ruffled many feathers, including the local Congress MlAs.
Party MlA Rinku joined the protesters against demolition drive on illegal colonies. He was later joined by other local MlAs expressing resentment over Sidhu’s action — making a dent to the image of not only the State Government, but also the Congress party.
Sidhu had all along been claiming that the OTS policy did not mean that anyone can encroach upon the government land.
During the meeting, it was also decided that the buildings, which were to be razed as per the Sidhu’s orders, will now be given a chance for regularization under the one-time settlement (OTS) policy, meaning thereby that these won't be demolished.
Sidhu said that there are few things which needed to be sorted out in Jalandhar and for the same, Jalandhar Mayor has been given 15 days time till July 5.
“The one-time settlement policy of Punjab Government is meant for the poor people and for those areas where the population has reached 60-70 percent and not for those who belong to the rich families, whose only aim is to grab the land,” he said.
He added that the Government would also issue Rs 30 crore for the development of Jalandhar Municipal Corporation.
later, Chaudhary Santokh Singh said that there was no resentment among any MlA and the meeting discussed various issues related to Jalandhar area.