AAP floods city with event hoardings, faces backlash
Avneet Kaur
Jalandhar, May 17
The Aam Aadmi Party took extensive measures to promote the ‘Sarkar Tuhade Dwaar’ event during a daylong programme in Jalandhar on Wednesday, saturating the entire city with hoardings.
5-star culture on the rise
- Advocate Harpreet Singh Azaad and councillor Jagdish Samrai criticised the state government for organising public meetings at expensive resorts
- They reminded the public that AAP had initially promised to address Punjab’s outstanding loan of Rs 3 lakh crore
- They have been conducting meetings in five-star hotels and resorts at the expense of the state, accumulating loans without a clear repayment plan
However, this action was met with widespread criticism from residents who expressed their disapproval on social media platforms. They condemned the party for displaying such hoardings and viewed it as a misuse of public funds.
Even within the city, no chowk or road, whether it was BMC, Guru Nanak Mission Chowk, Nakodar, Urban Estate Phase II, Cool Road, or Ladowali road, remained unaffected by these hoardings.
Expressing dissatisfaction with this visual pollution, Meenal Verma, a city-based activist known for her advocacy of ‘green swap’ among residents, commented on one of the posts featuring these hoardings.
She questioned the necessity of so many hoardings and their impact on the environment, emphasising the wastefulness of resources and the lack of sustainable practices. She also pondered which direction of development the city was heading towards.
Another resident shared a video of Guru Nanak Mission Chowk in a local Facebook group and raised concerns about the financial decisions of the state government. He questioned whether Punjab was a debt-free state and criticised the government’s lavish spending on advertisements. He highlighted the excessive number of hoardings, 15 in total at Guru Nanak Mission Chowk alone for the same event, and deemed it a sheer waste of public funds.
Akash Chohan, another resident, echoed the sentiment of excessive expenditure. While acknowledging the importance of government meetings for the general public, he suggested a change in the approach to reduce expenses.
Several other residents expressed similar sentiments, questioning the rationale behind placing thousands of hoardings across the city when the event’s details were already widely shared on social media.
Advocate Harpreet Singh Azaad and councillor Jagdish Samrai criticised the state government for organizing public meetings at expensive resorts. They reminded the public that the AAP had initially promised to address Punjab’s outstanding loan of Rs 3 lakh crore, which played a role in the rejection of the Congress party by the people of Punjab.
“However, the new government has broken records set by previous administrations by adopting an extravagant working culture. They have been conducting meetings in five-star hotels and resorts at the expense of the state, accumulating loans without a clear repayment plan. The growing debt raises concerns about the feasibility of paying off the interest, posing a significant challenge”, they said.
“Additionally, the government has failed to present a roadmap for employment, leading to increased consideration of emigration among the youth. The deteriorating law and order situation, impending electricity crisis, and burdens on the industrial sector have made it difficult for new industries to thrive in Punjab,” they further argued.
