Badals in US, chief secretary is the boss in Punjab

With chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and his son and deputy Sukhbir in the United States, Punjab is being run by bureaucrats.
Incidentally, Punjab governor Shivraj Patil is out of the state too — in Rajasthan. Patil was given charge of Rajasthan after the death of that state’s governor, Prabha Rau.

While the deputy chief minister has been away for more than a week, the chief minister joined him on Sunday evening. Both are in US to attend to Surinder Badal, Parkash’s wife.

However, what’s surprising is that the chief minister has not deputed anybody to officiate in his absence. As a result, hardly any minister is attending office in the secretariat and no important meetings are being convened.

Local bodies and industries minister Manoranjan Kalia, who’s from the BJP and is the seniormost cabinet member after the chief minister said there’s no official word on who’s ruling Punjab now. Kalia agreed the norm is to appoint an officiating minister when the chief minister is not present.

In the absence of the two bigwigs, the job of running day-to-day affairs in the state has fallen on chief secretary SC Aggarwal, who contacts the chief minister or his deputy only in emergencies.