Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee president Capt. Amarinder Singh on Sunday dared Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal to own moral responsibility for his government filing an affidavit in the SC, supporting Haryana’s stand on the SYL and apologise to the people of Punjab for the same.
“Just by saying that your law officer acted on his own, you cannot escape the responsibility since you happen to be the head of the government,” Capt. Amarinder reminded him, while adding, “no law officer or counsel acts of his own and he appears in the court after being duly briefed by the government”.
He also took a dig at Punjab CM Parkash Singh Badal and deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal, saying they had played an equally dubious role on the issue by getting the legislation passed in the Assembly but delaying the governor’s assent to it. This, he added, allowed the Centre and Haryana crucial time to approach the Supreme Court which ordered status quo thus defeating the very purpose of the act passed in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha.
The PCC president said, Mr Kejriwal was badly exposed in the matter either way. “Either his intentions towards Punjab are not honest or he has no control over what is happening in his government”, he remarked. Maintaining that Mr Kejriwal was very much in know of what his counsel stated in the SC, Capt. Amarinder said, he (Mr Kejriwal) was now trying to wriggle out in his characteristic manner and put the entire blame on the poor legal counsel as the issue exposed and boomeranged on him.
“His characteristic backing out notwithstanding, what his legal counsel stated in the Supreme Court is in strong coherence with what Mr Kejriwal had himself said earlier that all states including Haryana and Delhi should get the water,” he pointed out, while remarking, “it is a typical case of Mr Kejriwal trying to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds”. Capt. Amarinder said, Mr Kejriwal had all the right to take a stand he liked, but he must not try to play dual games. He said, Punjab did not have a single drop of water to spare for Haryana and the same evening after reaching Delhi, he changed his stand saying all the states had equal rights on the water.
