Former Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Friday lashed out at the Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, the deputy CM Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, and the Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu for their “reckless and irresponsible response to the grave security breach” during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Punjab visit on Wednesday.
“Channi, Randhawa, and Sidhu are acting like a confused lot, who have no idea about how to do their job and perform their duties”, Amarinder said in a statement issued here today, adding, instead of owning up the responsibility, they are running away from it and pass it on to their juniors, which is cowardice and not true leadership.
Referring to Channi’s “confusing and contradictory” statements on the security breach, he remarked, “in the morning he says something and orders an inquiry and by the evening he straightway denies that anything happened”.
He also ridiculed the CM’s “childish” statement that he will take bullets in his chest if there was any threat to the life of the Prime Minister.
“You are not there to take bullets on your chest, better focus on your job as the Chief Minister”, he told Channi.
Amarinder also had a dig at the Deputy Chief Minister Randhawa, who also holds the home portfolio, for saying Central security agencies should have ensured the safe passage for the Prime Minister.
“The deputy CM appears to be oblivious of the fact that the Prime Minister was very much in Punjab and it was the duty of Punjab government to provide all sorts of security”, he said.
“Recently you (Randhawa) were crying hoarse against an extension of the BSF jurisdiction saying, law and order is a state subject although it had nothing to do with the law and order, and today you are saying that the same law and order was the responsibility of the central agencies to escape responsibility,” he added.
The former CM had a special word of advice for Sidhu telling him, “you better avoid talking about issues you have absolutely no idea about, like how the Prime Minister’s security details are worked out”.
He said, with everyone, particularly his own party and the government has stopped taking him seriously, Sidhu was now trying to wade into the waters he did not know even ABC of.
Amarinder advised the Congress leaders to listen to the wise counsel of their own party president Sonia Gandhi who has asked the Chief Minister to investigate the matter and fix the responsibility.
“Now, I assume, you will say, even Ms. Gandhi is trying to side with Prime Minister Modi”, he remarked.