CHANDIGARH: Asking the young voters of Himachal Pradesh to be sceptic of the Aam Aadmi Party’s election promise of Rs 3,000 monthly unemployment allowance and 6 lakh government jobs, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) has asked Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann if the youth in his state had received any allowance and work.
In a statement issued here, SAD senior member Bikram Singh Majithia said that: “The lies of Delhi that were brought to Punjab are now being taken to Himachal Pradesh. The AAP government in Delhi has not paid even a rupee as unemployment allowance in eight years. It has ditched Punjab also and now it’s fooling the young voters of the hill state. If not, let Mann specify how many of the youth had received government jobs in the first six months of his tenure.”
Accusing the AAP government of not even filling the old vacancies in the government offices, he claimed that it was rather abolishing many posts, if not extending the probation period to three years, during which the employee gets only a fraction of the pay. “Even those jobs can be counted on the fingers,” Majithia claimed, adding that Delhi’s AAP government had a similar track record of creating a “measly 3,246 government jobs in 7 years”, so how will it deliver 6 lakh government jobs in Himachal Pradesh.
Asking the hill state’s voters not to believe AAP’s “guarantees”, Majithia said: “The only guarantee AAP can give you is that if elected to power, the state’s remote control will be with Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, while its own chief minister will serve as Kejriwal’s rubber stamp. All the interests of Himachal Pradesh, including the right to use its river waters, will be compromised like in the case of Punjab. AAP will arm-twist the Himachalis into serving the interests of the party in Haryana and Delhi. The state exchequer might be looted for the purpose.”
Claiming that AAP’s assurances of good governance and the welfare of farmers and the weaker sections had proved false in Punjab, Majithia also tried to suggest that the law and order had also collapsed in the state. He said: “The farmers came into crisis when the AAP government denied them minimum support price (MSP) for moong despite an assurance from the CM. “Instead of farmers’ income, AAP has doubled the rate of farm suicides and farm debt”. The farmers await compensation for crop damage, while the dairy farmers expect it for the lumpy skin disease.”
