New Delhi, February 27
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) said today that it would continue to disrupt proceedings in Parliament till the Centre meets its demand for waiving loans of debt-ridden farmers in Punjab.

“Parliament will not be allowed to function till the demand for loan waiver of poor farmers of Punjab is accepted by the Central government,” SAD leader Sukhbir Singh Badal said in a statement here.

“Farmers in the whole country and especially in Punjab are committing suicide (due to debt burden), but still the Central government is delaying the acceptance of its legitimate demand,” the SAD leader said.

SAD MPs, including S.S. Dhindsa and Sukhbir Badal, along with BJP MPs today disrupted Parliament seeking loan waiver for farmers.

Reacting on the Railway Budget, the SAD president accused railway minister Lalu Prasad Yadav of presenting a ‘Bihar-centric’ Budget and ignoring Punjab and a host of other states.

According to Badal, the project of connecting Chandigarh to Amritsar had been hanging fire for nearly a decade, but the railway minister had done nothing regarding it.

Lalu Yadav had also failed to appreciate Punjab’s demand for extending the freight corridor from Ludhiana to Attari, on the India-Pakistan border, said Sukhbir Badal.

Two new trains announced from Punjab were connected to obscure destinations in Bihar and of no use to Punjab or Punjabis, he said, adding that “if this is the way the Railway budget is to be handled, I would urge the Prime Minister to appoint a railway minister for every state, so that there is an end to discrimination in budgetary exercise.”