Chandigarh: In continued defiance of the Supreme Court ruling, the Parkash Singh Badal government on Wednesday passed a resolution in the state assembly against handing over land for construction of the long-pending Sutlej-Yamuna Link canal. The state assembly unanimously adopted a resolution “directing” the SAD-BJP government to not hand over any land belonging to the state to any agency or allow anyone to work on the SYL canal.
Going a step further, the state assembly, which met for a special session within a week of the Supreme Court’s November 10 ruling declaring as “unconstitutional” a Punjab law of 2004 terminating a water sharing agreement with Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi and Chandigarh, also adopted another resolution asking the state government to take up with Centre and neighbouring states the issue of levying “cost and royalty” for the water released.
A five-judge bench of the apex court had, on a Presidential reference, held that Punjab could not have unilaterally terminated the agreement.
