Shiromani Akali Dal today asked the UPA to immediately convene an all-party meeting to take a final decision on Jan Lokpal Bill as demanded by social activist Anna Hazare.
Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) today asked the UPA to immediately convene an all-party meeting to take a final decision on Jan Lokpal Bill as demanded by social activist Anna Hazare.
SAD president and Punjab deputy chief minister Sukhbir Badal said the party fully supported the anti-graft campaign of Anna Hazare and asked the Centre to involve all political parties besides NGOs to decide on the bill at the earliest.
By dilly dallying on the vital issue of corruption, the Congress party was sending a wrong signal to global investors, he said.
Accusing the Centre of meting out step-motherly treatment to Punjab, Badal said it was matter of regret that despite pleading with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the Centre had not sanctioned additional storage space for Punjab.
He said the wheat and rice procured by FCI was rotting in open due to lack of storage space.
Badal said he had requested the railway minister to allocate additional rakes for Punjab to transport old food grain stock from the state.
He said the state government has made elaborate arrangements for procurement of wheat and all agencies have been told to make payment to farmers within 48 hours of lifting of their produce.
Badal said Bathinda was all set to emerge as an important economic centre with the setting up of Rs10,000 crore textile hub in the district. The textile hub would provide direct employment to 50,000 girls of the state within the next one year, he said.
He asked farmers sowing Bt cotton to get the bill for their purchase as in the case of seeds found spurious, the government would be able to initiate criminal action against seed traders.
Badal said that Markfed and other agencies have procured sufficient quantity of quality Bt cotton seeds for distribution to farmers.
On charges of vendetta levelled by former Finance Minister Manpreet Badal, he said Manpreet himself was answerable to the people of Giddarbaha for the "reign of terror" unleashed by him during last four years.
He said the SAD-BJP government does not believe in vendetta. "The law of the land will take its own course," he added.
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