CM Bhagwant Mann opposes landing of US plane carrying deportees in Amritsar; lodges protest with MEA
With two more flights scheduled to arrive on February 15 and 16, Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann has arrived in Amritsar to receive the deportees.
“Being the head of the state, it is my duty to receive our natives. They might have broken the law in the US, but have committed no offence here. I have come specially to receive them,” he said, while disclosing that the government was firm on designing a rehabilitation policy for them too.
He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in the US having parleys with US president Donald Trump. “It is ironic that at the same time, migrants were being handcuffed and chained to be deported to India. Did the PM take up this inhumane treatment issue with Trump? I don’t believe he did that. The chained Indians deported to their native land appeared to be a return gift to Modi by Trump,” he said.
Doubting the intention of the Centre, the CM blamed that it was a deliberate attempt of the BJP-led Union Government to “defame Punjab”. He said that he had strongly lodged a protest with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) about “choosing Amritsar as the landing destination in writing”, but the response was still awaited.
A special flight from the United States, carrying 119 deported Indian nationals, is to arrive at Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport in Amritsar tomorrow. Sources said that a majority of the deportees belonged to Punjab.
The CM said illegal immigration was not the problem of Punjab alone but it was being projected like that.
“Despite Punjab being the food bowl of the nation and over 80 per cent sacrifices being made by the Punjabis in the freedom struggle, the BJP-led government has started a tirade to defame the state globally,” he said.
The CM questioned that if the criterion to choose the landing site was the maximum number of deportees, then why the first plane landed there when 33 deportees each were from Gujarat and Haryana and 30 from Punjab.
He alleged that it was a conspiracy to defame Punjab as it was the only state which had rejected the BJP.
