Expressing deep shock over the reports that even girls and women are getting hooked to drugs, the People’s Party of Punjab chief and former Finance Minister Manpreet Badal on Tuesday said that it has exposed the dark underbelly of what was once the most prosperous State in the country and considered to be a role model.
Manpreet, reiterating his earlier proposal of evolving a consensus to confront the menace of drugs which had assumed alarming proportions, said, “The issue is not that Punjabis are being portrayed as druggists as being made out by the ruling Akali Dal leadership but it is a stark reality staring in the face of the Punjabis”.
“One can imagine the situation when even the women in the family become addicts. The repercussions can be far reaching and too serious for a frontline State like Punjab,” he said. He alleged that the State Government was still to come out with any holistic policy to deal with such a situation. Manpreet urged the Government to given equal emphasis on both de-addiction and rehabilitation. “Of course, the most important step is tackling the menace at its very roots which is free availability of drugs in the State. Blaming Pakistan for smuggling amounted to shifting of blame as more prevalent are the synthetic drugs,” he added.