Former Union Minister Preneet Kaur supports separate HSGPC

Patiala, Jul 23: Former Union Minister Preneet Kaur on Wednesday advocated the formation of separate Gurdwara Committee for neighboring state Haryana to manage the Sikh shrines there.

Addressing Congress workers here, she took a dig at Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal for his "mis-placed priorities" saying that he preferred to go to Delhi to further rake up the Haryana SGPC issue instead of attending the Budget Session of the Punjab Assembly.

The Congress leader said the reason and logic for a separate Haryana SGPC was similar as argued by Badal and his style during the Punjabi Suba (state) movement.

"You wanted a separate state where Sikhs could have a majority. That ultimately led to the creation of Haryana and if the Sikhs there now want autonomy for running their own gurdwaras what is wrong in that?" she asked.

"Denying Sikhs in Haryana this right was absolutely unjustified," she said. Criticising the Punjab government for its alleged failure on all fronts, Preneet gave a clarion call to her party rank and file to start working for the ouster of "incapable, corrupt and unholy alliance" of SAD-BJP from power in Punjab.

"Akalis made tall promises with the electors before the last Assembly polls as well as the Lok Sabha elections but fulfilled none so far," she said.

"Sukhbir Badal (Punjab's deputy chief minister) promised a power-surplus state capable of selling power to Pakistan, but failed to get coal supplies for the state-owned Bathinda and Ropar plants," she said.

She said the new private power plants at Goindwal Sahib, Rajpura and Talwandi Sabo with a total installed capacity of 3,920 MW are not producing even 500 MW of power.

PTI