BJP refuses to react even as SAD counters Bajwa

Wednesday, 26/11/2014

http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx

CHANDIGARH: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the ruling alliance partner of the Shiromani Akali Dal in Punjab, chose to say nothing about the Enforcement Directorate (ED) ready with evidence to summon state revenue minister and SAD leader Bikram Singh Majithia in the multi-crore drug case.

“It is too premature. What do I comment on this?” Punjab BJP president Kamal Sharma said when contacted by HT. Though the BJP has been demanding resignation of chief parliamentary secretary (CPS) and SAD MLA Avinash Chander, who has been questioned by the ED on five occasions, the policy seems to be wait-and-watch in case of Majithia.

A series of developments over the past year have pointed towards the possibility of a break-up between the SAD and BJP. While the BJP was keen to shift the blame of a below-par show in Punjab in the Lok Sabha polls on the SAD and the drug racket allegations, the SAD’s decision to partner with the BJP’s rival INLD in Haryana also attracted sharp responses. Recently, Punjab BJP in-charge and Union minister RS Katheria had said the BJP was ready to fight alone in the assembly elections due in 2017.

Meanwhile, the SAD predictably came out all guns blazing in Majithia’s defence. Countering allegations by Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) president Partap Singh Bajwa, the Akalis on Tuesday alleged that Bajwa’s family “thrived on narcotics trade throughout their life”, and was now “deliberately confusing the issue to scuttle the campaign launched by SAD-BJP government on nefarious drug trade”.

In a joint statement, SAD general secretary Avtar Singh Brar and former deputy speaker of the assembly Darbari Lal said when Majithia had himself asked for an inquiry by an independent agency against him, Bajwa was unnecessarily dragging his name into the controversy.

Daring Bajwa to come clean on his “old connections” and “intimacy” with main accused Jagdish Singh Bhola, Brar said that when three FIRs were registered in Rampura Phul against Bhola by the SAD-BJP government in 2001, “it was Bajwa who got him exonerated immediately after the formation of a Congress government in 2002”. “Bhola is now parroting the names of SAD leaders at the behest of Bajwa.”

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https://www.brightpunjabexpress.com/index.php/2019/07/31/rana-gurjit-singh-inaugurates-markfed-sales-booth-at-lohian/

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Indian-Americans urge Trump to ‘fully support’ India on Kashmir

Sunday, 04/08/2019

https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/diaspora/indian-americans-urge-trump-to-fully-support-india-on-kashmir/813832.html

Washington : The Indian-American community in the US has urged the Trump administration to “fully support” India’s decision to revoke the constitutional provision that accorded special status to Jammu and Kashmir and to continue to exert pressure on Pakistan to end its support to cross-border terrorism.