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Tej Parkash to quit if no action is taken
Prabhjot Singh
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, December 27
Punjab Transport Minister Tej Parkash Singh has threatened to quit the Punjab Council of Ministers unless action is taken against the officials responsible for referring the complaint against his ministry to the Chandigarh police for investigation and the registration of a case.

Talking to ‘The Tribune’, Mr Tej Parkash Singh said this “arbitrary action on the part of the Punjab Vigilance Bureau has not only generated an unsavoury controversy by maligning the name of my family but also lowered the honour and credibility of the Punjab Government of which I am an elected representative. Stern action, including suspension of the top official concerned, is the minimum I expect, failing which I will have no choice but to quit the Council of Ministers.”

Sources close to the Transport Minister reveal that residential address mentioned by the complainant, Vinod Kumar, is of a house which is under construction. Another block of houses on the adjoining block has seven-eight families living there but none is aware of any transporter by the name of Vinod Kumar.

After a high-powered nine-member delegation of the Punjab Congress Legislature (CLP) met the Administrator of Chandigarh, Justice O.P. Verma, yesterday the case file was reportedly sent back to the Punjab Vigilance Bureau. The Chandigarh police has reportedly refused to take cognisance of the complaint. The Punjab Vigilance Bureau had forwarded the complaint in original to the Chandigarh police recommending action on it.

Interestingly, the Punjab Transport Department which allocates route permits for tourist buses as well as stage carriages had no application or request for a Amritsar-SAS Nagar route permit pending from complainant Vinod Kumar. The applications are normally processed by a high-powered committee and route permits are granted accordingly by the committee and not by the Transport Minister.

No preliminary inquiry was perhaps conducted to verify the basic allegations made in the complaint. Further, no attempt was made to confirm bona fides of the complainant.

Though the dissidents have got a fresh case to corroborate their general grievance that the Chief Minister’s coterie was resorting to strong arm tactics to browbeat any discontent in the Congress Legislature Party, the Chief Minister himself is in a piquant situation as the letter was forwarded to the Chandigarh police at the instance of the Chief Director of the Vigilance Bureau.

At one stage, sources reveal, the Chief Minister wanted to order the suspension of a senior official in the bureau, but realising that action on the complaint started from the top in the bureau, it was decided to mark an inquiry into the episode by the Chief Secretary. After this case, the demand for restructuring the Punjab Vigilance Bureau has been revived.

The dissidents still maintain that though the Chief Minister has removed two of his powerful advisers from their present positions, they were still reportedly controlling his Secretariat and running the show.

Meanwhile, several Congress leaders, including the general secretary of the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee, Mr Parminder Singh, has cautioned unconstitutional authorities in the Chief Minister’s Secretariat against interfering in the internal affairs of the party, failing which the matter would be taken up both by the Chief Minister and the Congress High Command.