Cong MLA Pargat issues gag order

Rachna Khaira

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, February 21

Despite a formal invitation sent to the media by the newly elected Mayor, Jagdish Raj Raja, to attend the crucial meeting of the Beas Canal Water Project (estimated to be worth Rs 1,000 crore in Jalandhar) today with a Netherlands-based consultant, Congress MLA Pargat Singh issued a gag order to the media to leave the conference hall even before the meeting could start.

Stunned over the ‘loutish’ behaviour of the former captain of the Indian hockey team in front of foreign delegates, mediapersons lodged a protest and apprised him that he could not issue any such order against the invitation extended by the Mayor himself.

To this, the MLA sat quietly but again after a few minutes, asked mediapersons to leave the hall. Perturbed, the mediapersons slammed him for keeping a crucial public interest under wraps from the public and left the meeting hall.

The Municipal Corporation, Jalandhar, today kickstarted the surface water project in the city to provide fresh water from the Beas. The project is expected to decrease the dependency of people on the groundwater.

With an estimated cost Rs 1,000 crore to be funded by the Asian Development Bank, a US-based consultant, Haasken, today introduced the project to Mayor Jagdish Raj Raja and Congress MLAs, including Bawa Henry (North), Sushil Kumar Rinku (West), Pargat Singh (Cantonment) and Rajinder Beri (Central).

The DPR will be prepared in seven months and consultants will check the feasibility of the project and also find out a convenient route for bringing the Beas water to the city.

After the survey, the consultants will identify whether Miani or Dhilwan will be feasible to draw water from the Beas.

A 15-member team would team arrive in the city soon which will also include hydrologist from Netherlands and two water treatment experts from Vietnam.

In the following weeks, the consultants will hold meetings with various government departments, including forest, railways, sewerage, irrigation and also the Shah Consultants who have been outsourced by MC for AMRUT.

Mayor remains silent

Despite extending a formal invitation to the media to attend the conference, Mayor Jagdish Raj Raja overshadowed by the three MLAs preferred to remain silent over the uncouth action of Pargat Singh. While the other Congress MLAs Rajinder Beri and Bawa Henry did not intervene, Raja too could not gather courage to apprise the furious MLA that the media was in fact invited by him.

MC employees hold protest

Posing huge embarrassment for the Mayor and the Congress MLAs in front of the foreign delegates, over 200 employees of the MC office thronged the corridor outside the conference hall and raised slogans against the Congress-led state government and the Mayor. The employees, the majority of whom are Class IV employees, slammed senior officials for withholding their monthly salary despite the passing of twenty days.

While making a mockery of officials, Punjab Sanitation Workers Union president Chandan Grewal said while the officials were discussing a project worth Rs 1,000 crore in Jalandhar, they could not release a meagre Rs 15 crore as salary to the MC staff.

“We do not have money to buy milk for our children and feed our families,” said Grewal.

He added that it does not matter which party forms the government, the future of the employees always remain bleak.

Pargat, Bawa enter tussle with staff

It seemed like a bummer day for the Congress MLAs as they entered into yet another tussle with the MC staff this time. Perturbed over the humiliation faced in front of the foreign delegates and also a team that came from Delhi to assess the projects to be carried under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) scheme, the Congress MLAs came out of the conference hall but were confronted by hundreds of employees who demanded the release of their monthly salary. The tussle grew further after a worker approached Pargat and asked him to intervene. To this, Pargat and other MLAs asked the employees to approach the Mayor but the employees said they will not allow them to leave the premises till they gave assurance to provide.

Another Congress MLA Bawa Henry too asked the employees to leave the office immediately. Slamming the MLAs for their egoistic attitude, the workers union has threatened to intensify the protest further if their salaries were not released in the next two days.

Pargat said the matter had already been discussed with Punjab Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal who had assured to release their salaries by Friday.