Villagers allege inaction in bungling of government funds by two sarpanches

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, January 12

For the past few years, youth activists of Bhinder village at Rayya block in Baba Bakala constituency are running from pillar to post for bringing two sarpanches to the book.

The two sarpanches of Bhinder village were accused of bungling government grants worth Rs 39 lakh in between 2003 to 2013. However, even after making rounds of officials of Rural Development and Panchayat Department as well as meeting Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, nothing has been done to recover the misappropriated funds.

Residents of the village, headed by Charanjit Singh Bhinder, who is also a whistleblower in the alleged bungling, have now decided to knock at doors of the Punjab and Haryana High Court for justice.

“There is no concrete policy of the SAD-BJP government to end the corrupt practices as political leaders themselves shelter corrupts. For past one decade we are making rounds of the BDPO, the DDPO, director, Rural Development and Panchayat Department, besides approaching the CM and Deputy CM, but to no avail. Nobody has bothered to get the accused booked and recover money,” Bhinder alleged.

He said elderly people were called in offices by the BDPO and the DDPO in morning and at the end of the day asked to leave without any meeting. In a similar instance, he said, depot holders of the village bungled government ration meant for poor families and blue card holders for six years. He fought for them and got their duplicate blue cards made.

He was accompanied for former SOI president Gurdev Singh, a comrade leader Balkar Singh Randhawa, Gurinderjit Singh Dhillon and Rajdeep Singh Sidhu, besides others.