After failing to re-dig the controversial Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal at Punjab border last month, Haryana's leading opposition party the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) will protest in national capital Delhi on Wednesday on the same issue.
After holding demonstration at Jantar Mantar, the INLD protesters would march towards to 'Gherao the Parliament' if the Prime Minister Narendra Modi does not give them time to meet. Seeking Prime Minister's (PM) intervention on the SYL canal, INLD's two members of Parliament, 19 legislators and workers will gather from across the state, led by senior party leader Abhay Singh Chautala, plan to give memorandum to the PM on the issue.
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Apart from the memorandum, the INLD has also plan to submit resolutions passed by various Khaps (community council) and Panchayats (village councils) on the SYL canal water issue. Chautala who is the Leader of the Opposition in Haryana, has announced that his party would continue its fight on the SYL issue till the state gets its
legitimate share of water from the neighbouring Punjab.
More than 90 INLD leaders including Chautala were arrested by the Punjab police on February 23 while trying to enter the state for digging up the controversial portion of the SYL canal falling in Patiala district. After arrest, the INLD leaders were sent to judicial custody till February 27 by a Rajpura court.
Failing to win "water war", the INLD leaders, immediately after their release from Patiala jail, announced to 'gherao' the Parliament'.
Criticizing both the ruling BJP and the Congress party for adopting dual standard on the SYL water issue, the INLD also strongly raised the SYL issue in recently concluded Budget Session of the Haryana Legislative Assembly. State Assembly witnessed ruckus many times over the issue.
Decades-old contentious issue between the two states again hit the headlines during the previous year when the Supreme Court on November 10, held as unconstitutional the 2004 Punjab Termination of Agreements Act passed by Punjab Assembly to terminate the SYL canal water sharing agreement with neighbouring state. The decision led a political storm in both of the states.