Headlines
Resign or shut down businesses, Amarinder tells Badal
Chandigarh, May 3
Congress leader Amarinder
Singh on Sunday demanded that Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal should
either resign from his post or shut down his family's transport and
other businesses, including the controversial Orbit Aviation, as it was a
clear case of conflict of interest.
"All these years, in a clear
case of conflict of interest, you have brutally abused your position
and power and multiplied your fleet of buses from 40 to 250 by
threatening and bullying not only other private transporters, but also
the PRTC (Punjab Road Transport Corporation) and Punjab Roadways, into
submission, which has eventually led to everybody, except you, suffering
huge losses while you are making huge profits," Amarinder Singh, the
deputy party leader in the Lok Sabha, said in a statement issued here.
Amarinder
Singh said that when he became Punjab chief minister in 2002, he was
on the board of directors of some companies like Ranbaxy, DLF,
Industrial Cables and Mount Shivalik Breweries, and steeped down.
"I
resigned from all the companies after seeking legal opinion from the
Punjab advocate general, who told me that this amounted to conflict of
interest since all these companies were based in and operating from
Punjab," he noted.
He alleged that the Badals had grabbed about
250 route permits but were actually plying about 500 buses on all the
profit-making routes.
"No government official or police can dare
to stop these buses as your conductors and drivers misbehave with
officials and get away with it. The Moga incident is the outcome of the
same immunity from law you have provided to your erring and bullying
drivers and conductors," Amarinder claimed, adding that Punjab Police
and administration were being misused to promote business interests of
the Badal family.
Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and senior lawyer
H.S.Phoolka said on Sunday that he has written to President Pranab
Mukherjee, seeking action against the Punjab government for complete
breakdown of law and order and official machinery.
He said that the entire administration in Punjab was working to shield the Badal family and their business interests.