Badal govt acquired land for SYL to please Devi Lal: Capt

Nikhil Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Shahkot (Jalandhar), July 28

Punjab Congress president Capt Amarinder Singh today released “documentary evidence” to prove that Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal had acquired land for the SYL canal in Punjab.

“I challenge Badal to deny or dispute a single word of what I am saying about his role in acquiring land for the SYL to please his friend Devi Lal,” he said during an interaction with the media on the sidelines of the 14th session of “Halke Vich Captain.

“Badal issued orders for land acquisition on February 20, 1978, vide notification no: 113/5/SYL and 121/5/SYL under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act. With this, the process of land acquisition for the SYL canal started,” Amarinder claimed.

Badal then wrote to the Haryana Government vide letters no: 7/78-IW(i)-78/23617 demanding a payment of Rs3 crore more as he had already taken Rs2 crore for land acquisition. This was in pursuance of an agreement between him and Devi Lal, then Chief Minister of Haryana.

The PPCC president claimed this was acknowledged by Devi Lal in the Haryana Vidhan Sabha on March 1, 1978, where he proudly claimed that it was because of his personal relationship with Badal that he had convinced him for land acquisition for the SYL. “For personal relationship with Devi Lal, Badal put Punjab’s interests at stake,” he said.

He claimed that Badal had also decided to hold a function to lay the foundation stone and Devi Lal was to preside over. He said the matter got delayed and later both Badal and Devi Lal lost their respective elections.

Amarinder asked Badal to spell out his next course of action in case the Supreme Court decided the case against Punjab.