Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today said that the installation of NDA government at Centre was mandatory to maintain the tempo of overall growth and prosperity in the state. Addressing a public gathering here after laying the foundation stone of Govt. Residential School in the premises of Local Govt. College for Boys, Mr. Badal said that the Congress led UPA government at Centre was deliberately discriminating against the opposition governments in the state on the issue of disbursement of grants and were even stalling the process of development according to the felt needs of these state governments. Congress was making all out efforts to destabilize the Punjab economically and even it was bent hell upon to break the backbone of agriculture. The Centre was fixing the rates of agricultural inputs like pesticides, insecticides, diesel and fertilizers without taking states into confidence and these rates were ever increasing without announcing a corresponding hike in the Minimum Support Price which has rendered our farming a non-profitable profession and consequently country’s peasantry has been pushed into debt trap. To bail out the beleaguered farming community, the state government was paying bills of agriculture tubewells of farmers from its own resources thus bearing a whopping expenditure of nearly Rs.6000 crore.
Badal further said that the countrymen could only get rid of mass employment and un-controllable inflation only if NDA’s was voted to power at Centre. He said that the recent elections had almost proved that Congress would be decimated from the country in the near future. He said that the SAD-BJP alliance had planned a massive rally at Jagraon on December 21 which has now been postponed due to inclement weather especially the dense fog across the state and fresh date would be announced soon. The Chief Minister mentioned that Congress never regained power in any state, where it was defeated consecutively twice and thus it would never come to power in Punjab and likewise, Congress would be decimated from the country after the Lok Sabha polls.The Chief Minister announced that the state government has taken path breaking initiatives for the welfare of the all sections of the society despite stiff resistance from the Centre which could never deter us from drifting away pro-people agenda. Recently we announced to provide Atta at Re.1 to the poor people and a massive exercise to issue new blue cards for the beneficiaries under this scheme was carried out across the state. He said that Punjab was the first state in the country which initiated the atta-dal scheme to provide atta @ Rs.4 and Dal @ 20 per Kg and now we have further slashed the rate of atta to merely Re.1 per Kg. Apart from this the state government has made stupendous efforts to garner huge investments, making our state self-reliant in power, preserving our cultural legacy besides making our farming self-sustainable and offering tremendous job opportunities to the unemployed youth. He said that few people were trying to disturb the congenial atmosphere of peace, communal harmony and amity for their narrow and vested political interest, adding he said nobody would be allowed to disturb the hard earned peace and harmony in the state.
Earlier, the Chief Minister laid the foundation stone of residential school where the poor and bright students securing 80% and above marks in matriculation would be given free education in 10+2. He said that six such schools were being constructed across the state which would certainly upgrade the quality and standard of education. Emphasizing the need to impart quality education to the students, the Chief Minister said that it was an established fact that with all pervasive socio-economic development globally, education has now even seen as the very foundation of family’s development. He said that SAD-BJP alliance government had made phenomenal progress in imparting quality school education at all levels be it primary, elementary and secondary with an objective to produce quality students, who could compete with their counterparts from private and convent schools and later gainfully employed during their career.Mr. Badal further said that the state government had recently launched Dr. Hargobind Khurana Scholarship scheme under which any student regardless of income limit secured 80% or above marks in 10th would be granted scholarship of Rs.2500 per month or Rs.30000 per annum. He said that six such residential schools would be opened across the state and today the foundation stone of second had been laid after Bathinda during last week besides foundation stone of another school would be laid at Jalandhar this afternoon. He said that similar schools would be soon set up Patiala, Mohali and Amritsar.
Listing the major achievements in the education department, Badal said that our government was giving special focus on the education under which 17 new degree college and nine new universities had been opened besides as many as 72000 teachers have been recruited. All these initiatives had enabled our state to achieve the first position from the 14th as per country’s overall education index. On the occasion, Education Minister Mr. Sikander Singh Maluka gave a detailed account about the stellar progress made on the education front. Vice Chairman Punjab State Planning Board Prof. Rajinder Bhandari, Advisor to Chief Minister Mr. Mahesh Inder Singh Grewal also spoke on the occasion. Prominent amongst others who attended the function included PWD Minister Mr. Sharanjit Singh Dhillon, Chairman District Planning Board Mr. Hira Singh Gabria, Mr. Manpreet Singh Ayali, Mr.Darshan Singh Shivalik, Mr. SR Kaler and Mr. Ranjit Singh Dhillon all MLAs.