Chandigarh, March 18: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has held the successive governments in the state responsible for the huge slump in industry and demanded that the government in the saddle should come out of its cozy confines and help reviving the pace of industrial development by allowing special income tax rebate and other packages as allowed to certain hilly state in the country.
In a statement issued from party headquarters in Chandigarh here, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA, Gurmit Singh Meet Hayer said that the industry and employment were synonymous to each other. He said due to the deep slump in industry in the state, employment opportunities have dwindled over the years.
Accusing the Amarinder Singh Government in the state of backtracking on the promises it made to the people of Punjab of generating 25 lakh jobs for the youth per year, it had aggravated the problem, he said.
On the occasion, industry and trade wing chief Naina Mittal said that the subsequent SAD-BJP and UPA governments in the state took no cognizance of the demands of the industrialists and traders in the state leading to the sorry state of affairs, she said.
She recalled that when Sukhbir Singh Badal was Industries Minister in the then NDA government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, it had allowed certain special tax rebates and other packages to some hill states, including Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Uttrakhand. She said Badal didn’t speak on behalf of the people of Punjab, which reflected his anti-traders’ face.
She said the worst phase the industry faced in Punjab was the militancy during the 80s when a good number of industrialists and traders had to flee the state. Batala, Mandi, Jalandhar and others, which were known as hub of industry in Punjab, suffered a lot during those dark days. A major of industrial units in these area stayed either defunct or had shifted to other states, she lamented.
Accusing union minister for food processing Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Hayer said that it was a matter of grave concern that she failed to set up even a single unit in the state during her 5-year term, thereby loosing track in terms of generating enough job opportunities in the state.
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