Amarinder Singh Meets Sonia, Seeks Leadership Change In Punjab
IANS, 09 Jan, 2015 02:29 PM
Former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh Friday met Congress president Sonia Gandhi and is understood to have sought a change ofleadership in party's state unit.
Sources said Singh, who is deputy leader of the party in the Lok Sabha, met Gandhi at her residence and conveyed his views about the working of party's Punjab unit.
Singh told her that the party will not be able to win the next assembly elections in Punjab under present state chief Partap Singh Bajwa, said the sources, adding he told Gandhi that Bajwa has not been able to infuse vigour in the party against the Akali Dal-BJP coalition government.
The sources said that Congress smells a good chance in Punjab due to apparent anti-incumbency against the government. The two parties in ruling alliance also have had differences on some issues including release of Khalistani terrorists and supporters languishing in prisons despite completing their sentences.
Assembly elections in Punjab are slated to be held in 2017.
Bullet trains are set to become a reality in India with the first service between Mumbai and Ahmedabad as Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government sought to run Indian Railways - one of the world's largest - like a "commercial enterprise but serve like a welfare organization".
The increasing seizures of drugs, especially heroin, in recent years shows that Punjab has emerged as a major transit point for those in the illegal drugs trade. But the state itself, facing a worrying drugs menace, is hooked to pharmaceutical intoxicants.
Among the subtle changes associated with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government are those dealing with the media and nowhere has it affected a news-hungry media's working more than in the way news sources from the government have completely dried up and resulted in shrinking of the culture of intermittent Breaking News on television.
Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal Monday said he will again meet Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and urge her to expedite the process of bringing back 39 Punjabis trapped in the Mosul region of conflict affected Iraq.
British Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne Monday said it was exciting to visit India when the excitement about the Indian economy and the optimism about the prospects for future growth are palpable.
