The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national leader, Punjab affairs co-in-charge Raghav Chadha on Friday said Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi likes lights and cameras but he is a ‘no-action’ CM.
Addressing a press conference, Chadha said Chief Minister Channi visited the area affected by pink bollworm and posed for photographs with two farmers of Bathinda and did a lot of publicity by putting those pictures on the walls, behind the buses and on the hoardings at bus stands and railway stations along with other places but those farmers have not got the compensation yet.
The AAP leader said the camera and advertising enthusiast ‘dramebaaz’ (a person with a habit of exaggerating situations) Chief Minister Channi forcibly hugged the farmers but cheated them in the name of compensation.
He said Channi hugged Balwinder Singh Khalsa, a farmer affected by pink bollworm, but did not give him even a single penny in the name of compensation.
Chadha said CM, Channi, did a lot of campaigning for the elections by putting the photo of another farmer Harpreet Singh on the back of every bus, but the government did not help him either. He said that Channi is not the Chief Minister but the ‘Campaign Minister’. Chief Minister Channi likes light and camera-like film shooting but does not like action, he said.
The AAP leader further said CM has also followed the footsteps of Captain Amarinder Singh who during his tenure as previous Chief Minister, had also taken a photo with farmer Budh Singh, who had a loan of about Rs 2.5 lakh, but that loan was also not waived.
The Aam Aadmi Party has demanded the CM, Channi, to give compensation to every farmer affected by pink bollworm. Rs 75,000 per acre for farmers and Rs 25,000 per acre landless farmers-laborers should be provided as compensation, it said.
Chadha said in the Malwa region from Mansa to Maur and from Sardulgarh to Talwandi, cotton crop has been damaged in more than one lakh hectares of land. He said by displaying the photos of the farmers, votes are not obtained; votes are obtained by giving compensation and by doing work.
He said Channi used the policy of ‘use and throw’ on the farmers, which was very sad. He asked Chief Minister Channi to rise up from his pretentious and ‘bramebaaz’ image and focus on work; otherwise like Captain’s fall, the farmer of Punjab will also remove Channi from the chair.