MP Amritpal Singh in Dibrugarh jail, his teams attending to flood-hit constituents

As floods have hit Sultanpur Lodhi and Tarn Taran areas along the Beas river, the locals are not feeling the absence of their Lok Sabha MP Amritpal Singh. Even though he is lodged in Dibrugarh jail when his constituents are deep in trouble, his massive army of young men is on the job for the last three weeks ensuring relief and rescue operations in his constituency. Both Sultanpur Lodhi and Tarn Taran fall in Amritpal’s Khadoor Sahib Parliamentary constituency.

Huge containers loaded with relief material, including langar, packs of biscuits, bottled drinking water, fodder for animals, medicines and other items are daily parked on a safe location close to Baupur Mand in Sultanpur Lodhi from where his teams dispense the relief material among the area people.

We have set up teams of 200 volunteers to handle relief measures. We are also arranging two boats with which we can independently reach out to villagers who have chosen to stay in the flooded waters. We initially used to distribute cooked food like rice and kadhi, but now since a lot of langar is coming from nearby locations, we are only distributing dry ration.

Jaskaran S Kahan Singh Wala, core committee team representative, SAD Waris Punjab De

The teams of his party SAD — Waris Punjab De (WPD) — have even set up temporary godowns of relief material in Sultanpur Lodhi and Tarn Taran where stocks of dry ration used for langar has been stored.

The presence of Amritpal has been ensured by his teams by way of putting up banners with his bold pictures all around trucks. His men stand guard around trucks and keep offering prayers for the well-being of the marooned villagers.

A representative of the 13-member core committee team of the SAD WPD, Jaskaran S Kahan Singh Wala said, “We have set up teams of 200 volunteers at both the locations to handle the relief measures. We are also arranging two boats with which we can independently reach out to villagers who have chosen to stay in the flooded waters. They work in rotation in a well-coordinated manner. We initially used to distribute cooked food like rice and kadhi, but now since a lot of langar is coming from nearby locations, we are only distributing dry ration.”

Jaskaran Singh said, “Since our MP is not around, our responsibility for his voters gets doubled up. Those who voted for him should not think that their vote has gone in vain and there is no one to take care of them in these troubled times. We have shared our numbers everywhere in the area. So, if they cannot call up Amritpal, they can call us and we shall be there for his people 24x7.”

Jalandhar-based SAD WPD leader Mahinder S Bajwa said, “We are not just taking care of Amritpal’s constituents. We, as a party, have also sent our teams in the Kalanaur area of Gurdaspur, and flood-affected areas of Ferozepur and Fazilka. Around 100-odd youth are working for the party in each of the seven flood-hit districts. Today, I was in Kalanaur with my team.”