Chandigarh, Aug 8 (IANS) AICC General Secretary Bhupesh Baghel on Saturday said that people in the state were eagerly waiting to give full mandate to the Congress in the Assembly elections that may be held either in February 2027 or November this year.
Baghel said after touring 18 districts across Punjab, he had noticed overwhelming enthusiasm among the people for the Congress as they were fed up with the Aam Aadmi Party government, which had completely destroyed Punjab.
Speaking during the ‘Har booth, Congress Mazboot’ programme in Malerkotla, Baghel specially praised the sacred soil of the town, recalling how in 1705 the then Nawab had opposed the bricking alive of two younger Sahibzadas by the Governor of Sirhind.
Exhorting the Congress workers to unite and get battle ready, the party’s state in-charge invoked great leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Maulana Azad and others, who on this day in 1942 had raised their voice against the British, asking them to ‘Quit India’. He said that while the British had left, the BJP government at the Centre was treating Opposition leaders like that and was also trying to finish the smaller and regional parties in different states.
He pointed out how the BJP was misusing the investigating agencies like the Enforcement Directorate against the political opponents. Baghel said all the institutions had been captured. The former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister had special praise for the Gen Z, which had risen against the “dictatorship and terror” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
“When nobody could speak against them, the Gen Z forced them to make Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan resign.” He also recalled how the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, stood by students against the police brutalities.
Speaking on the occasion, state party President Amarinder Singh Raja Warring announced that once the Congress forms government in the state, it will free sand mining from the mafia. He asked Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann as what happened to the Rs 30,000 crore he and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal had claimed would be generated from sand mining.
Warring noted that AAP could merely generate Rs 300 crore, and what happened with Rs 30,000 crore should be known to Mann and Kejriwal. He said if the state gets just Rs 300 crore and the rest of the money would be pocketed by the mafia, it is better to set the sand free for people to use and prevent the mafia from looting.
Warring also called for police reforms in the state and announced that after the Congress forms government, reforms will be initiated which will make police accountability mandatory. This, he added, was important to prevent abuse and registration of false cases against innocent people. Every inquiry officer who orders registration of a first information report (FIR) will be held accountable and made to compensate for any willfully wrong FIR.
–IANS
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