Chandigarh, May 1
The SAD President, Mr Parkash Singh Badal, today said he had no sympathy for the arrested Punjab Service Commission Chairman, Mr Ravi Sidhu. He even favoured the scrapping of all appointments in which money had played a role. The recruitment scandal, he continued, was the outcome of “personal enmity” between Mr Sidhu and Mr Bhupjit Singh, who enabled the Vigilance Bureau to lay a trap.
At a Press conference at his residence, reporters asked him: “Were you aware of the large-scale corruption in recruitment through the PPSC and, if so, why did you not take any action? Is it true that recruitments to state-cadre services were allowed only after a deal was struck with him to accommodate sons of you aides? Was your Sector 9 house used for the delivery of question papers?”
Mr Badal said: “The Press should first get its facts correct. No complaint was made to me about corruption. Tell me, did anyone of you know of any particular case? If so, did anyone report it? The commission is a constitutional body and there has to be proof. Let me also say that the sons of Kala Singh and Hardip Singh had appeared in the interviews, but were not selected. No one has been living in the Sector 9 house for the past five years. Neither was the house pinpointed in newspaper reports. Anyone can level any allegations”.
He was also asked why his former ministers were seeking anticipatory bail. he said; “The Press is projecting everything as if all what had happened in the commission was the doing of the Akalis. Yet, no Akali’s name has figured in the lists given by touts and published in the media. We have no faith in the Vigilance Bureau.”
Mr Badal also said his party would extend full “cooperation” to the government to fight corruption. But he also warned that “corruption” should not be used as a weapon to defame or unleash a reign of terror against Akali workers and sympathisers. “It is no way to settle political scores by trying to implicate me and the entire Akali leadership in false cases through conspiracies and police repression”. Dealing with corruption and political opponents were two different things and the former should not be used to harass opponents, he added.
He released a two-page statement reiterating that the SAD was ready to face the cycle of “repression” against the Akalis. He, however, warned Capt Amarinder Singh of a dangerous social and political confrontation brewing in the state. He charged that the Chief Minister had neither the will nor capacity for governance. Punjab had been turned into a police state. This was evident from the persons chosen as advisers and other key officials, who were infamous for their role in crushing human rights.
Mr Badal also referred to state “excesses” in the Malout byelection, the role of the Election Commission, allegations relating to property owned here and abroad and a false impression of the state’s fiscal situation. Referring to the fiscal situation, he said as it were projected why had the government burdened the Advocate-General’s office with so many law officers or why had Capt Amarinder Singh appointed so many
OSDs.
