SAD, AAP hooked on to 'Nasha' war in Punjab

CHANDIGARH: Ahead of the 2017 assembly polls, a war over drugs has started between ruling Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab.
The nasty row began after a video song highlighting drug crisis in Punjab by AAP's Kumar Vishwas went viral on YouTube. The song 'Nasha' was launched by Vishwas in New Delhi last week. It has created a furore on Facebook, YouTube and micro-blogging website Twitter, generating more than a lakh `likes' and 50,000 `hits' in the past 48 hours.In the five-minute song in Punjabi, Vishwas makes veiled attacks at ruling Badal clan, invoking their family surname a dozen times and accusing them of patronizing sand and mining mafia. He also accuses Punjab police of peddling heroin through stark visuals of a cop counting notes after allowing a drug deal. The video also features lookalikes of Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and his deputy chief minister son Sukhbir Badal.
“Sukhbir bana dukhbir... jadon Parkash karne laga andhera,“ says a part of the song's lyrics. Though AAP maintains that the effort is to only create awareness about the rampant substance abuse problem among youth, SAD has threatened to slap a legal notice on Vishwas for allegedly labelling the Jat community as drug dealers. Fielding a question on the song, the chief minister SAID,“Their (AAP's) job is just to criticize us now. They are least concerned about development.“
The SAD also hit back at Vishwas, saying charges of illicit relationship were levelled against him in 2015.
“Let Kejriwal first explain the charges levelled against Vishwas before taking a dig at us. They have people with loose morals,“ said SAD MLA Virsa Singh Valtoha.
The AAP, however, is in no mood to relent. The party said it would go ahead with the screening of the song during its upcoming rallies.
“The Akali Dal is completely perturbed now that the problem of drugs and suicides is being highlighted in the national capital.They had for years been trying to conceal it. Now, they question the freedom of ex pression and art as seen through Vishwas's song,“ said AAP's Punjab convener Sucha Singh Chottepur.
A recent AIIMS study, commissioned by BJP's new Punjab chief and Union minister of state for social justice and empowerment Vijay Sampla, had revealed that drugs worth around Rs 7,500 crore are consumed ever year in Punjab and there are 1.23 lakh heroin-dependent people in the state. BJP is SAD's ally in Punjab.