Chandigarh, October 17
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Punjab senior leader and Leader of Opposition Harpal Singh Cheema accused the Punjab government of trying to save former minister Sadhu Singh Dharamsot who had embezzled crores of rupees in SC students’ post-matric scholarships. Cheema said the action taken by Social Welfare Minister Raj Kumar Verka in the Channi government to register a case against some officials was just an attempt to deceive the people.
In a statement issued from the party headquarters here on Sunday, Harapl Singh Cheema alleged, “Like the Captain government of the Congress party, the Channi government is defending former minister Sadhu Singh Dharamsot, who was usurping the scholarships of SC students. The Congress party has certainly changed the Ali Baba of its government, but there has been no change in the intention and policy of the Congress government to save the scammers.”
Cheema said that after the formation of the new cabinet of Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, the new Minister Raj Kumar Verka had promised to immediately investigate the scholarship scam and take strict action against the culprits, but now even the minister has backed down from taking action. Instead, they are trying to shield former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh’s partner Sadhu Singh Dharamsot from legal action by pretending to take action against some officials.
The AAP leader said that when Sadhu Singh Dharamsot was running the Social Welfare Department in the Cabinet of Capt Amarinder Singh, crores of rupees of post-matric scholarship were deposited in the accounts of fake colleges and the future of SC students was jeopardized. During this time more than 2 lakh SC students had to drop out of school. He said that at that time senior officials had handed over the report of misappropriation of scholarship funds to the then Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh; but Capt Amarinder Singh neither took any action against his partner Sadhu Singh Dharamsot nor against the senior officials responsible for the matter.
Harpal Singh Cheema said that the Aam Aadmi Party has been demanding action against former minister Sadhu Singh Dharamsot and other officials involved in scholarship scam for a long time and the party volunteers struggled for this from the streets to the Assembly. He said the Channi government was taking action against some officials in the name of pretence but was avoiding taking legal action against Sadhu Singh Dharamsot, who was the minister of the department. Cheema asked the Channi government when and what action would be taken against former minister Sadhu Singh Dharamsot; responsible for ruining the lives of lakhs of SC students in Punjab.
