NOT SITTING WITH CS, BUT MINISTERS WILLING TO STAY IN GOVT WITH THE SAME CS AS CUSTODIAN OF CABINET RECORDS : MAJITHIA
SAD REITERATES “FIR” DEMAND BUT SAYS RESIGNATION OR SACK OF MINISTERS A PREREQUISITE FOR JUSTICE
MINISTERS TALKING ONLY OF LIQUOR LOOT WHILE PEOPLE FIGHT FOR THEIR LIVES
Chandigarh May 13 ( Wishavwarta)– The Shiromani Akali Dal today alleged that the Congress government in Punjab is in a state of an open gang-warfare among leaders of the liquor mafia holding high offices in the govt .
“This is virtually a bootlegger’s liquor lust and loot out in the open. It is really shocking that while people are fighting for their lives, the ministers and other Congressmen are losing their sleep not over finding solutions to the problems being faced by the farmers, farm labour, shopkeepers, small and medium traders, employees and other hapless Punjabis during the Coronavirus pandemic but only and only over their shares in liquor loot.
Referring to the unseemly ministers-bureaucrat confrontation in the state, senior Akali leader Mr Bikram Singh Majithia said that it was unprecedented that the ministers have been accused of running massive illicit liquor cartels, and these allegations have reportedly been levelled by their own head of the civil service, and that too in the course of a cabinet meeting.
” It doesn’t get any bigger than this. In the circumstances, the ministers have lost their ethical legitimacy and have no moral right to continue in office. They must either resign immediately on moral grounds or be summarily dismissed on corruption charges. This must be followed by the registration of FIRs on criminal charges of corruption and the loot of public exchequer by all those whose names feature in this free-for-all mafia shoot-out.
“But the resignation or dismissal of the ministers is the first prerequisite to ensure that the guilty are no allowed to abuse their official authority to influence the probe, ” he said.
Mr Majithia said that the ministers seemed to have launched a counter attack senior bureaucrats only to deflect public attention from the allegations of liquor loot levelled by the Chief Secretary in the cabinet meeting. “The ministers want to put the CS on the defensive simply through political blackmail and public calumny.
“However, if there is substance in the allegations of either the CS or the ministers, then the government must dare to act either against and file an FIRs against whichever side is prima facie guilty,” he said.
Mr Majithia said that it was odd that some senior ministers were not willing to sit in a cabinet meeting in which the CS would be present but they have no objection to remaining in the cabinet in a government in which the same Chief Secretary remains the custodian of the cabinet records. If they have any principles, then instead of refusing to sit in the cabinet meeting with the officer, they should show the moral daring and resign from the cabinet unless the CS is removed. But they won’t take such a principled stand,” said Mr Majithia.
He said that the civil-war like conditions have resulted in a complete administrative paralysis and the people have been left by the government to fend for their own lives in the lethal pandemic.
He said that allegations reportedly levelled by the Chief Secretary over patronage of liquor dons by ministers resulting in an unprecedented scale of corruption worth thousands of crores of rupees need to be proceeded on.
