CCL ROW: ‘NEITHER ME NOR BADAL SIGNED FILE AFTER POLL CODE’

CHANDIGARH: Former finance minister Parminder Singh Dhindsa on Friday dared the Congress government to produce evidence that the ₹31,000 crore legacy cash credit limit (CCL) account was taken over as loan in an agreement signed with the Union finance ministry on March 10, 2017, a day before the assembly election results that brought the Congress to power.

Addressing the media in the press gallery, Dhindsa said neither he nor then chief minister Parkash Singh Badal had signed any file after the poll code of conduct came into force. “We had negotiated a settlement with the banks not the Central government. And this huge gap between credit limit availed from the Centre for procurement of foodgrains for central pool and foodgrain stocks in the account books of the state procurement agencies has been piling up for many years. We were forced to do it as the consortium of banks had refused to allow us fresh limit for procurement,” he said.

of funds for crop diversification, Sandhwan said ₹60 crore is too little. “The government is not paying adequately to Punjab Agricultural University which is depending on multinational companies to funds its research work. How can we expect the university to be independent?” he asked.

He said Akali workers were benefitting from the government’s farm debt waiver, because it was the SAD-BJP supporters who got the loans during their 10-year tenure and defaulted when Amarinder promised to waive these.