Chandigarh: The Aam Aadmi Party on Saturday demanded to implement Punjab and Haryana High Court monitored Justice Kuldeep Singh interim report on illegal encroachment on Panchayati and forest land related to Punjab govt. in surrounding areas of Chandigarh. Addressing the media, the leader of opposition in Punjab Vidhan Sabha, Sukhpal Singh Khaira and senior leader of AAP and MLA from Kharar, Kanwar Sandhu said that in recent years multiple cases have been witnessed where the powerful political people, bureaucrats and others have encroached the land violating section 42(A) and The Punjab land Preservation Act-1900.
Khaira said that in a recent case the SDM Kharar has quashed the illegal girdawari of 458 kanals and 2 marla of village seonk that was illegally transferred by the concerned Niab Tehsildar to Rana Ranjeet Singh without the consent of land owner. He said that there have been hundreds of similar cases happened in the area in previous times and the illegal and forced encroachment is still going on in the area. He said that the Punjab Vidhan Sabha in 2007 had passed an order prohibiting the registration of land in forest area, but even after that the cases were witnessed where illegal registration was done by the officers in compliance with the political leaders.
Sandhu said that a committee was formed by the Punjab and Haryana High court in 2012 under the Justice Kuldeep Singh and he submitted his interim reports in 2013. He said that till now nothing has been done on the reports submitted by Justice Kuldeep Singh and no action was initiated against those violated the law. He said that as per the record 2275 Acre land of just village Nayagaon was illegally converted on the names of different people. He demanded that the reports of Justice Kuldeep Singh must be probed and a judicial inquiry must be initiated in the regard. He also demanded that all the registries and transfers happened after 2013 must also probed. Sandhu requested Punjab and Haryana High court to take suo-moto cognizance in the matter.
Speaking on the recent decision of Punjab cabinet to shut down 1647 out of 2147 Seva Kendra across the state the leaders said that the decision shows that the govt. is not at all serious about the state affairs and concerns of the people of state. Sandhu said that thousands of employees of Sewa Kendras will be rendered jobless and common, poor and needy citizens will have to face hardships at the hands of multiple offices for getting their petty jobs done.
Disapproving the Punjab cabinet’s decisions of putting electricity meters on tubewells and sending amount of power subsidy in farmer’s account, Khaira said that it is nothing but a step towards windrowing the power subsidy provided to the state farmers.
Khaira said that the move of govt. is mainly to shift the focus of farmers agitating for debt waver as promised by the govt. He said that before trying to burden the already troubled farmers of the state, the CM must ask his ministers and congress MLAs to shun the farm subsidy.