CHANDIGARH, August 28: Asserting and reiterating that the Congress government will waive off the farmers’ loans, Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee president Capt Amarinder Singh today lashed out at the Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal for saying that no government can waive off farmers’ loans.
“Just because you are too incompetent to provide any relief to the farmers does not mean no one else can do”, he told Mr Badal, while reacting to his statement, made in Baba Bakala today, that he (Capt Amarinder) was misleading farmers by promising them loan waiver.
Capt Amarinder said, with state pushed into a debt trap of over Rs 1.25 lakh crores, nobody expected Mr Badal to waive off loans. “A government which cannot pay salaries and pensions will not be expected to waive off the loans as it needs financial skills which Mr Badal has already exhausted for amassing personal wealth only”, he remarked, while promising that with better financial management state can afford complete loan waiver for farmers and he will do that as he had done that in past also.
He reminded the Chief Minister that during his previous term between 2002 and 2007, he had settled all the loans of farmers taken from the cooperative banks. He said, his government had started negotiations with the PSU banks also, which could not be completed as the Akalis took over in 2007. “Rather you owe an explanation to the farmers as why you did not carry forward our policy and settle the issue with the PSU banks”, he told Mr Badal.
Wondering over Mr Badal’s ignorance, he said, it was surprising that someone who had become the Chief Minister for the fifth time was saying that the governments cannot waive off farmers’ loans. “You need the will and the resources and unfortunately you possess none”, he said, while adding, Mr Badal has never been sincere with anyone, including the farmers and when someone was trying to help them out, he was trying to create confusion and misunderstanding.
Capt Amarinder reminded Mr Badal that the NDA government at the centre, of which his party is a part and parcel, wrote off bad debts to the tune of Rs 114 lakh crores of the corporate houses. “If you can waive off such a humongous amount, why can’t you waive off farmers’ loans which amount to less than Rs one lakh crores”, he asked, while adding, “if industry can be provided the stimulus, so can be the agriculture and farmers and we will do that”.
‘Punjab Congress is not controlled from Delhi’
Reacting to Aam Aadmi Party MP Bhagwant Mann’s statement saying that the Punjab Congress was also controlled from Delhi like his party, the PCC president clarified that Congress being the national party has a national set up headed by the Congress president Ms Sonia Gandhi. “But she does not interfere, leave aside control, into the state affairs and it is the PCC president who is in overall control of the state affairs”, he said.
Capt Amarinder asked Mann not to justify the dictatorial and autocratic control exercised by Arvind Kejriwal on the AAP Punjab leaders by referring to the Congress party. “Let me remind you, unlike Mr Kejriwal, Ms Gandhi never aspired to be the Punjab Chief Minister”, he told the Sangrur MP, while adding, not only is it the PCC president who exercises complete control over the party, even tickets are also allotted on his (PCC president’s) recommendations only.
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