AAP leader hits out at Navjot Singh Sidhu for joining 'anti-Punjab' forces

CHANDIGARH: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) today accused Navjot Singh Sidhu of joining "anti-Punjab" forces, "weakening the people's movement against a corrupt regime and backing an illicit alliance" between Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh and the ruling Badal family in the state.

Former BJP MP Sidhu has recently joined the Congress following his ex-MLA wife.

AAP state convenor Gurpreet Singh Ghuggi, who is contesting the upcoming Punjab Assembly polls from Batala, said Sidhu targeting the Badals for corruption would not absolve him of complicity with the "corrupt SAD-BJP regime" for 10 years.

He pointed out that Sidhu's wife Navjot Kaur was the chief parliamentary secretary who never came out of the government and alleged that Sidhu too turned "a blind eye towards Punjab" by staying away from the state for about seven years.

"Sidhu was a partner in the corruption and crimes of the Badals," Ghuggi alleged, adding that the cricketer-turned-politician had not only switched from "one corrupt party to another", but also changed his "political father".

The AAP leader described Sidhu as an "opportunist, self-centred and directionless" man who was "no better than a rolling stone".

Ghuggi claimed that Sidhu had sided with the Congress for "self-glorification" with the hope that the party would offer him the post of chief minister in Punjab.

He pointed out that Sidhu had earlier branded the Congress as the "mother of corruptions" and held it responsible for the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in the country.

Ghuggi said Sidhu had targeted the Badal family for corruption and amassing huge wealth in 10 years and wondered why did he maintain a silence on the "corruption" of Amarinder who was named an accused in a Rs-400 crore land acquisition scam by Amritsar Improvement Trust and in the Rs-2,300 crore city centre scam in Ludhiana.

The AAP leader alleged that the Congress-led UPA government was "neck-deep in corruption" which resulted in huge scams such as the ones related to the Commonwealth Games, allotment of coal mines and 2G spectrum.

Pointing out that as a BJP MP, Sidhu was seen in Lok Sabha targeting the Congress on corruption, Ghuggi asked, "Is the Congress now a holy cow and the only saviour of Punjab?"

Claiming that neither Amarinder nor Sidhu had a roadmap for Punjab, he alleged that both had their eyes on the chief minister's chair "which would remain a pipe dream".

Ghuggi alleged that Sidhu was "busy in comedy shows" when the farmers of Punjab were committing suicide, the unemployed youth were protesting on the streets and protesting employees "were being hounded and beaten up by the police".

Not only Sidhu, all the BJP leaders were "mute spectators" when it came to the activities of the "drug mafia headed by state Revenue Minister Bikram Singh Majithia", he said.