CAPTAIN DUBS KHATTAR’S CHARGES LUDICROUS

CHANDIGARH: Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Monday flayed his Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar for blaming Punjab for the violence that followed the indictment of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmit Ram Rahim Singh.

Dubbing Khattar’s charges against the Punjab government as ludicrous, Amarinder said it was a desperate and futile bid by the Haryana CM to wriggle out of his own responsibility in the matter. The Haryana chief minister was trying desperately to cover up his own government’s failure in preventing the carnage in the wake of the verdict against the dera chief, he said.

Amarinder, who is in London for the launch of his book on the battle of Saragarhi, was responding to the stinging remarks made by Khattar against the Punjab government and its police in a television interview.

The Punjab CM said that Khattar’s despair was evident from the fact that even after suspending five of their own police personnel over the alleged conspiracy to whisk Ram Rahim away post the judgement he was now trying to fix responsibility for the entire affair on Punjab police. “Why did his government suspend the five Haryana cops in the matter if they were not guilty,” he asked.

Amarinder also lashed out at his Haryana counterpart for blaming Punjab over the build up of one lakh Dera followers in Panchkula ahead of the court verdict in the rape case against Ram Rahim.