CHANDIGARH: Despite the loud talks of Sukhbir Singh Badal, boasting to have made Punjab a surplus state in the power sector during Badal dispensations, but the facts speaks contrary to such fake and bogus claims. This was stated here today by Bir Devinder Singh former Deputy Speaker of Punjab Vidhan Sabha.
He stateda that the truth of the matter is that power sector in Punjab is on the verge of virtual collapse. The lustful greed of the Badal family and Capt. Amarinder Singh; they both are directly responsible and solely to be blamed for the fall of the power sector in Punjab . Not only their lopsided policies to handle the power generation in Punjab but their clandestine commercial interests in all the deals of the power sector, made things worst.
Immoral gluttony of S. Parkash Singh Badals, Sukhbir Singh Badal and Captain Amarinder Singh, responsible for the copmlete collapse of Power sector in Punjab. Both these families when in power systematically ensured the closer of the Public sector thermal plants in Punjab to give providence to the private sector for their vested commercial interests. They arbitrarily signed the power purchase agreements with the private players on exorbitant rates little realizing the critical fall out of such an asymmetrical deals on the fragile fiscal health of Punjab .They both looted the power sector turn by turn with impunity for their vested interests and siphoned off the money either in to their family businesses or parked the ill-gotten money in foreign Banks, in their off-shore secret accounts. This is why the Punjab today is facing the ignominy of a failed State, being the State and the power sector under an unprecedented debt. But on the contrary both these families; Badals and the Royals of Patiala, flourished beyond imagination at the cost of the destruction of Punjab.
Unfortunately, The Punjab, one of the top most States of India has become a fiscal wreck gradually; thanks to the successive regimes of Badals and Royals of Patiala. The discernible decline in the power sector began in the period from I997 to 2002, when Parkash Singh Badal negotiated and signed the first Power Purchase Agreement for Goindwal Sahib Thermal Plant. It is pertinent to mention here that initially the cost of the Goindwal Sahib Thermal Plant with the capacity to generate 1000 megawatts of power was estimated at 5000 crore but most ironically it was revised by the successive regimes under the pretext of renegotiating the PPA, the cost ultimately went ridiculously up from 5, 000 crore to 25, 000 Crore. Let Sukhbir Singh Badal and Capt. Amarinder Singh explain this deal alone, on a public platform.
I challenge both of them for an open debate for the complete collapse of the ‘power regime’ in Punjab, in a ‘Town Hall’ which could be moderated by any credible Media House known for its neutrality or any other platform of the sort . Such a debate on the public platform would expose all the nexus responsible; till then the unilaterally enhanced atrocious power tariff for domestic consumers and industrial sector be called off. Why should general public in Punjab suffer because of the voracious greed of these politically outdated skeletons; the dinosaurs of their times?
If at all they have not committed any sin against the State of Punjab and plead innocence then they should jointly come forward to pass a unanimous resolution on the floor of the Punjab assembly requesting the Punjab and Haryana High Court to constitute an Accountability Tribunal to probe the collapse of the power Sector in Punjab, consisting of at least three sitting High Court Judges from outside Punjab. The Accountability Tribunal, constituted as such should identify the individual who were at helms from time to time who have committed obstinate errors with impunity for their vested interests. After such a judicious exercise and the scrutiny with precision, the persons found guilty then must be subjected to the ‘Nuremberg Trials’ for betraying the fundamental interests of Punjab.