Sukhbir Badal asks Punjab CM to give financial aid to farmers for managing paddy stubble

Chandigarh: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Singh Badal on Wednesday said the Supreme Court has directed Delhi's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government to pay Rs 450 crore it is spending on advertisements towards completion of the Delhi-Meerut RRTS project, and called for similar intervention in Punjab directing Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to provide financial aid to farmers for managing paddy stubble.

Asserting that it was high time that the AAP government in Punjab is held accountable, Badal called for an audit of all infrastructure projects which were on a standstill because the state was not releasing funds for them.

"This along with the squeeze on the release of funds for urban local bodies and rural development is causing untold suffering to the common man and needs to be remedied immediately through judicial intervention," the SAD chief said.

He said the apex court order was also an eye opener as it blew the lid off the manner in which AAP governments were using public money for self publicity even as they denied money to infrastructure projects.

He said just like in Delhi, the AAP government in Punjab was not releasing any money for infrastructure projects but continued to splurge on propaganda based advertisements.

"The situation has become such that money is not even being released for social welfare benefits like old-age pension and Shagun (Ashirwad) scheme."

Appealing for urgent judicial intervention by the apex court to force the AAP government in Punjab to undergo a course correction, Badal said "the AAP government failed to incentivise farmers to encourage them to manage stubble despite promises prior to the 2022 election that the government would collect stubble from farmer fields and pay them for the same."

He said it was shocking that the hard-earned money of Punjabis was being burnt on spreading AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal's agenda across the length and breadth of the country even as farmers were denied compensation for crop damage and election promises like giving Rs 1,000 per month to all women remained a pipedream.