Not my concern, here to serve people, says Dhaliwal amid row over portfolio

Minister Kuldeep Dhaliwal has been at the centre of a controversy after a report revealed that he headed the Department of Administrative Reforms, which never existed, for 20 months. Dhaliwal, who now only holds the portfolio of NRI Affairs, downplayed the issue, saying his focus is on serving Punjab, not on whether the department exists or not.

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He said, “You must have read that they had wound up the department. As for me, I had returned from the US to serve Punjab and not to take up any departments. My only aim is to save Punjab and bring it back on track. It is up to the CM to take whatever kind of work he wants to take from me. The department’s existence is not my concern.”

The minister was in Jalandhar at the inauguration of a seminar on ‘Punjab’s Global Migration’ at the office of NRI Sabha.

The response of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to the report, however, was different from Dhaliwal. “We have only changed the nomenclature of the department,” he told the reporters at Bhawanigarh.

The report drew sharp reactions from the leaders of all parties. Union MoS and BJP leader Ravneet Bittu went on to ask for the resignation of CM Mann. “The comedian has made a comedy of himself. It will be better for him to take an exit or else more such things will get uncovered which he won’t be able to face. The CM should stop befooling the public. It was a fudged ministry which Dhaliwal had been handling for 20 months. All this while, the minister had no secretary, no officials and no files going back and forth,” he said in a video message.

Leader of the Opposition Partap Bajwa and Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia also lambasted the the state government. Bajwa said, “Did the CM’s Chief Secretary not tell him that this department had been wound up 36 months ago? God save the people from this government.”

Majithia said, “The government has made a mockery of itself. Now, the minister must tell which good work he has done for the state holding a non-existing portfolio for 20 months.”

BJP leader Vijender Gupta said, “The people of Punjab had given a huge mandate to AAP. Its minister took 20 months to realise that he had been holding the portfolio of a department, which never existed.”