Kejriwal promises special package for border areas

Manmeet Singh Gill and Gurbaxpuri

Tribune News Service

Tarn Taran/Amritsar, January 15

Delhi Chief Minister and AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal today promised a special package for border areas.

Addressing a gathering at Naushera Dhala in support of Tarn Taran candidate Kartar Singh Pehalwan, he said border area residents suffered the most in case of tension between the two neighbouring countries.

“People of the area are still being wooed with promises of paved streets. Leaders of the Congress and the SAD never talk about setting up universities and colleges in the border belt,” he said.

He said a special package would be announced for the development of border areas, if AAP was voted to power.

He also promised to set up agro-based industries in the area.

“Industrialists will be encouraged to set up units and they will be bound to employ at least 80 per cent of the workforce from local areas,” he said.

He promised for the implementation of the Swaminathan report within three years of the formation of the government in state.

Naushera Dhalla village is the native village of in-laws of SAD leader and Finance Minister Parminder Singh Dhindsa. As expected, not many from the village attended the public meeting but they seen discussing politics while standing near the meeting venue. Most of those who attended the meeting belonged to areas near the village. Many NRIs from Dubai and Canada too were roaming around the venue.

A shopkeeper on route to the rally venue was overheard saying, “This is for the first time that any party other than SAD has organised a political meeting in the village.”

Others in the village too were seen discussing the role the party would play in the elections.

On his way to the Khalra and Patti, Kejriwal’s cavalcade was greeted by crowds standing in various villages. In an attack on Bikram Singh Majithia, he accused him of patronising the drug trade and said, “Majithia and his men would be sent to jail and punished.

They would be forced to cough up the money they have made from the illegal trade.”

He said Badals and Capt PPCC chief Amarinder Singh were playing a friendly game.