Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
Chandigarh, Congress Deputy Leader in the Lok Sabha Capt Amarinder Singh today disapproved of the indiscriminate removal of the elected office bearers of the party including the district and block presidents. “Rather than keeping our doors open, we are trying to shut these and that too at our own elected office bearers who have been there with the party for such a long time”, he told reporters in an informal conversation on the sidelights of the state convention of the All India Jat Maha Sabha held here today.
The Congress leader also sought a thorough probe into the circumstances under which the proclaimed gangsters were allowed entry inside the Punjab Congress Bhawan during the visit of the Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi.
“It is shocking to learn that while the elected representatives and senior leaders like Rana Sodhi, Arvind Khanna and Rana KP were not allowed to enter the Congress Bhawan, the proclaimed offenders and gangsters, who turned out to be special invitees of the PCC president, were having a free run of the place”, he said, adding, this is a serious matter and needs to be probed and investigated thoroughly.
Referring to a number of phone calls shared between the gangsters and the PCC president, Capt Amarinder said, he cannot shrug off the blame by saying that he did not know them and had randomly taken their calls. It was not an isolated single call but at least ten calls were exchanged and these were of long duration.
Replying a question about the PCC president’s claims that all dissenting voices had been silenced, the Congress leader asserted, Congress is a democratic party and nobody can silence anybody. “Everybody is free to air his views while remaining within the party discipline”, he said, while adding, expressing dissent on a particular issue does not mean indiscipline.
He strongly disagreed that the Congress was divided in Punjab. “We are very much united under the leadership of Ms Sonia Gandhi and Mr Rahul Gandhi”, he asserted, while adding, there are some differences at the local level which will need to be resolved at the earliest to ensure that the Congress puts up the best fight in 2017 assembly elections. He observed that the current dispensation did not appear to be competent enough to do that.
