Congress leader from Punjab slams EC decision on gas pricing

New Delhi, Apr 7: A

leader and a former MP on Monday accused the

of overreaching its role by asking the government to defer notifying the doubling of price of

till the general elections are over.

In a letter to Chief Election Commissioner V S Sampath, former Punjab minister Surinder Singla said "the recent decision of postponing the implementation of the decision of the Cabinet on gas price speaks volumes of surrendering to a political party's interest."

In an apparent reference to AAP, he said the political party was now taking credit for EC's decision asking the Centre to defer gas prices. He said the poll panel has "overreached" its role and "power and given a bad name to the Election Commission for taking partial decisions".

Singla said the decision was taken by the Union Cabinet much before the Model Code of Conduct came into effect.

"One would like to understand from you whether the cabinet decisions taken by state governments and the central government before the model code goes into force could also be asked to postpone," he wrote.

He claimed he has knowledge of various decisions of Punjab government aimed at "pampering" the electorate and sought to know the view of the EC on the issue.

"I feel that the reputation of EC of being free and fair is in great danger as it is singling out one decision of the Union Cabinet which was taken well before announcement of elections," he said.

PTI