Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
Chandigarh January 30 – SAD president and former Deputy CM Punjab Sukhbir Singh Badal today urged the Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh to intervene personally to stop the closure of 1600 people centric Sewa Kendras in the state, saying that “These Kendras are meant to stop the harassment of the people in government offices and eliminate the reasons for corruption” Sukhbir Singh today wrote a letter to the Punjab CM Capt Amarinder Singh, Sukhbir Singh attacked what he called “tughlakiya ideas of the present FM Manpreet Badal, adding that Manpreet as FM in SAD-BJP government had openly advocated the abolition of all subsidies like Free Power to the Farmers, Old Age and other Pensions in the state, Shagun scheme and free power for the Dalits etc. But the Chief Minister in our government firmly refused to burden the people of Punjab merely to help the Finance Minister to earn some brownie points with the arm chair economists “ But will you succumb to this pressure is what people want to known.,” Sukhbir asked the CM in his letter.
Mr Badal wanted to know what profit did the government want to earn from the poor and the needy who look at the government as a “provider” of services while the finance minister looks at it as Finance Company which must make profit out of every service it provides. But how do you make profit at the cost of the people? “
Sukhbir Siingh said that the “the skewed ideas of Punjab FM may lead to closing down virtually every citizen-centric service in the state. “The public transport system and the offices of the revenue officials, like Patwarkhanas, hospitals run at a loss by the Health Department, schools and colleges also a loss-making facility maintained for the benefit of the people as a citizen-centric service may have to be losed down. In fact, even the police department may have to be shut down because this department too is in the real sense only a “Sew Kendra” by another name. But these will not bring in revenue to the government. By closing these facilities, the government can have its treasury overflowing with
revenue. But will then there be a government worth its salt to serve the people?” he asked
Sukhbir in his letter to CM further said, “ These services in Sewa Kendras were meant to protect the natural and
constitutional right of the people to getting their routine works done without harassment or humiliation in government offices. You, as CM of the state, must appreciate “that corruption in govt offices cannot be eliminated merely by changing faces in government offices through routine transfers of officers. In order to end corruption, you must change the very system that was breeding corruption. “
Mr Badal said that the “question which the Chief Minister of the state, and not his Tughlakiya Financne Minsiter has to ponder wasif “common man was merely a source for profit making for the government. “If the citizen centric facilities appear to your Finance Minister only avenues for profit, then the government itself should be shut down because by the Finance minister’s own admission, it is running into losses and debt. Why have a government which is not making a profit, ” said Sukhbir Singh in his letter to the CM Sukhbir said that it was the duty of the state to provide hassle free services to its citizens. The Sewa Kendras symbolize the government’s resolve not only to provide these services but also the government’s resolve to ensure that corruption by officials and middlemen in the name of facilitating people’s routine tasks was also effectively ended. “
Sukhbir Singh said that People had heaved a sigh of relief as they started getting over 100 citizen-centric services almost at their door step – such as issuing the death and birth certificates to people with ease and without delay or a resort corruption.
