Former Haryana Chief Minister and Leader of Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Wednesday congratulated the
Chhattisgarh government for introducing Old Pension Scheme (OPS) to employees, on the lines of Rajasthan.

Calling the move a gift to employees of the Chhattisgarh government, he said the Haryana government has completely ignored this demand.

“The BJP-JJP (Bharatiya Janata Party- Jannayak Janta Party) government of Haryana had a chance to accept the demands of the employees in this Budget but the coalition government completely ignored it in the budget. Even the JJP, which had promised to implement the old pension scheme in its election manifesto, did not consider it appropriate to raise its voice in favour of the employees,” he said.

Hooda once again declared that Congress would pressurise the government to accept the demand of OPS. “If the present government does not implement OPS, employees will be given the benefit of OPS when our government is formed,” he said.

The Leader of the Opposition said in the budget presented on Women’s Day, the government ignored all the sections, as well as women. “The government refused to accept the demands of even ASHA and Anganwadi workers who have been agitating for their demands for a long time. The entire budget was nothing but filled with blank rhetoric and
misleading figures. False announcements were made by the government as per its habit, which the government is not interested in fulfilling,” he said.

Giving the example of a medical college, he said BJP has been continuously announcing the establishment of medical colleges in every district, ever since coming to power, but no medical college was built by this government in the state during its entire tenure.

“In some districts boards have been put up only in front of vacant land in the name of a medical college. The government has announced to build 4 more colleges in this budget which only means that the government has announced to set up 4 new boards in the state,” Hooda said.

The Leader of Opposition said the budget has left the farmers and the elderly disappointed as no mention was made of doubling farmers’ income in the budget presented in 2022. Nor did the government increase the old age pension this time.