DW BUREAU / Bathinda

Former union minister and Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal today appealed to Punjabis to usher in a real change in Punjab by voting for the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in the forthcoming parliamentary polls, saying the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) were one and would betray them again like they had done in the past.

The Bathinda MP, who was talking to newsmen here while campaigning in the city, also took on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saying the NDA government led by the BJP had gone back on its words to the farmers and had failed to either make the Minimum Support Price (MSP) Committee or fulfill its promise to the Sikh community to release all Sikh detainees who had complete their life sentences. She also asserted that she had done her best to get projects for her constituency and that the record spoke for itself. "Those who are speaking on behalf of the BJP in this constituency and claiming I did not get anything for Bathinda or Punjab should tell what Punjab has got in successive budgets after the SAD parted ways with the BJP".

Condemning the AAP and Congress for misleading Punjabis, Mrs Harsimrat Badal said "both these parties are aligned at the national level and even sharing the stage with each other and holding joint campaigns. However they are fighting separately in Punjab in the hope of dividing the votes between themselves".

Urging Punjabis to beware of lies of the AAP government and instead judge it by its performance, Mrs Badal said "this corrupt and insensitive government has betrayed each and every section of society. It has failed farmers by refusing to give msp on all crops as promised by chief minister Bhagwant Mann. It has not given compensation for crop damage to farmers. It has not given any government jobs to youth. It is denying social welfare benefits to the weaker sections. The industry is in the grip of extortionists due to which home grown investors have taken investment worth Rs 20,000 crore out of the State. Hundreds of youth are dying due to the increased drug menace which is patronized by AAP legislators even as the law and order situation is in shambles".

Mrs Badal also said it was condemnable that civic amenities were decaying across the State because no attempt was made to conduct any maintenance during the last seven years of Congress and AAP rule. She said far from the government being run from villages as promised by the chief minister, it was being ruled from Delhi and Punjab funds were being used to conduct election campaigns of AAP across the country.
(editor@dailyworld.in)