हिंदी
Ready to sacrifice anything but will not allow grabbing a single inch of land: Sukhbir Singh Badal
The next dharna at Bathinda on August 4
SAS Nagar (Mohali )/ Chandigarh: July 28, 225
Thousands and thousands of farmers and landowners today braved heavy downpour and traffic jams to join the Shiromani Akali Dal’s protest rally here as part of the party’s state-wide agitation against the AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal’s Land Grabbing Scheme.
Today’s dharna covered the districts of SAS Nagar (Mohali), Ropar and Fatehgarh Sahib. The next dharna would be held at Bathinda on August 4.
The anti land-grab scheme dharna, addressed by the SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal saw unending streams of aggrieved people thronging the entire area in front of the GMADA headquarters here. Such was the response to the protest rally that it brought normal life in the town to a standstill with locals also joining it as a gesture of solidarity with the farmers and other victims of the government’s land grab.
Addressing the rally, Mr Badal said that the magnitude of the land loot by the Delhi masters of the AAP government in Punjab had no precedent in history. And there was no development rationale behind it. He said that the 2000 acres acquired for the Aerotropolis project in Mohali was still not utilized while the government is going ahead with grabbing another 3,535 acres in its extension alone.
The Akali president reiterated that his party would not allow the government to grab even an inch of farmers’ land.” I am ready to sacrifice anything but we will never allow any land to be taken by the government without the farmers’ prior consent,” he declared..
Mr Badal also pointed out that the government had snatched the farmers’ fundamental right on the Change of Land Use (CLU) of even the land not acquired in the areas under its greed. “There is no precedent for such a sweeping deprivation of farmers’ rights on their own lands,” said Mr Badal, adding that Tehsildars had already issued official orders banning CLU of these areas.
Mr Badal said that in sharp contrast to the Kejriwal’s dictatorial land grab approach, the SAD government led by the late S Parkash Singh Badal had implemented a policy prepared in consultation with and consent of farmers, through a committee which comprised of local sarpanch for fixation of the prevailing market price of the land in question.
“We ensured that the farmers got 400% of the prevailing land price. And even after this, the land acquisition was made subject to the consent of the farmers or land owners,” said Mr Badal adding that farmers and other aggrieved segments of society still fondly miss the compassionate Badal touch in every government policy .
The SAD president further said that he had been receiving resolutions against the Kejriwal’s land grabbing policy passed by land owners from all across the affected regions in the state.
Among others, senior party leaders including Dr Daljit Singh Cheema, NK Sharma, Hira Singh Gabria, Parminder Singh Sohana, Gurpreet Singh Raju Khanna, Sarabjit Singh Jhinjar, Sohan Singh Thandal, Darbara Singh Guru, Arshdeep Kler, Ranbir Singh SOI, Gulzari Moonak, Kuldeep Kaur Kang, Charanjit Singh Kalewal, Baljit Singh Bhutta, Ravinder Khera and Jasbir Kaur also addressed the gathering.
