Ready for conversation with Capt on investment: Sajjan

Sandeep Dikshit

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 21

Canadian Defence Minister Harjit Singh Sajjan wound up his Punjab visit today by regretting the lack of conversation with Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh for investment opportunities. Both former military officers did not have a face-to-face meeting as the Punjab Chief Minister termed the Canadian a Khalistani sympathiser.

The pitch was queered on the eve of his departure to India after a Canadian provincial assembly passed a resolution that termed the 1984 killings of Sikhs as genocide.

In a conversation squeezed between the inauguration of the Canadian Consulate General’s office and departure to Mumbai to interact with industrialists, Sajjan said his Government was “ready for a conversation with the Punjab CM regarding investment opportunities”.

Having been hounded for reactions to Capt Amarinder’s rather unusual boycott of a son-of-the-soil from a country that has hit the economic sweet-spot and, therefore, well placed to provide investments Punjab sorely needs, Sajjan added a caveat: “We don’t get involved in the politics of other nations. Neither do we like others getting involved in our affairs.”

Sajjan, one of the few Sikhs to make it to the political high table of another nation, sought to rid the notion that his was a personality-driven trip although it had some personal moments such as the obeisance at the Golden Temple or a visit to a Jalandhar charity. “It’s no secret that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wants to reach out to India. That is why several ministers have visited India to introduce ourselves for greater dialogue.”

He felt the time had come for overseas Punjabis to have a bigger vision for investment rather than pouring money into building palatial mansions in their home villages. “This is tremendous but a lost opportunity as well. There is very little concrete investment [by them] in Punjab,” he commented. In fact, the trend is the other way round, he noted. There are over 1,000 Indian companies that have invested about $15 billion in Canada but there is very little Canadian investment coming to Punjab.

Canada, the world’s sixth largest exporter of military hardware, was keen to get a bite of the lucrative Indian defence sector but indicated that these were early days. But civil nuclear energy, a scaffolding for strategic ties with India, was performing well. Uranium shipments have started arriving in India and the conversation has expanded to reactor technology. 

Canadian minister slept on cot in village 

Bambeli (Hoshiarpur): Many residents of Bambeli, the ancestral village of Canadian Defence Minister Harjit Singh Sajjan, finally got to meet him on Thursday night. Earlier, security personnel had not allowed him to enter the pandal where villagers had made arrangements to welcome him. Sajjan had dal-roti and kheer for dinner and slept on a cot on the rooftop of his ancestral house. He met his relatives and members of the panchayat. Sajjan expressed satisfaction over the development works carried out in the village. Sarpanch Paramjit Singh said Sajjan went down memory lane, fondly recalling his childhood days. Early on Friday morning, he had paranthas with curd and pickle before leaving for Chandigarh. –Sanjiv Kumar Bakshi