Chandigarh, September 19
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Punjab has hailed the campaign of questioning political people by the poor Dalit community, like the farmers, terming it as an awareness campaign. The AAP argues that political parties will no longer be able to mislead the poor, Dalits and farmers along with any other section, with false promises and hoaxes.
In a joint statement issued from the party headquarters here on Sunday, senior leader of the AAP and Deputy Leader of Opposition Saravjit Kaur Manuke, MLAs Principal Budh Ram, Rupinder Kaur Ruby, Master Baldev Singh, Kulwant Singh Pandori, Manjit Singh Bilaspur and Jagtar Singh Hissowal, said that the ruling Congress, like the previous Badal-BJP government, betrayed the poor and the Dalit community and used the Dalit community as a vote bank.
Saravjit Kaur Manuke hailed the practice of questioning the ruling party and other political parties to take stock of the promises made to the Dalit community by social activists and organisations of the Dalit community, stating that the farmers’ movement has also awakened the Dalits. She said this awareness campaign started from 114 villages of Sangrur district should be spread all over Punjab so that no political party could mislead the people with false promises in view of 2022 elections.
The AAP MLAs demanded from the Chief Election Commissioner of India to legalize the election manifestos submitted by political parties before the elections and make it a legal document; so that in future no political party can dare to fool the people; as it was done by the Badal-BJP and the Congress-Captain in 2017.
The leaders said that the Congress had promised on page 27 of its 2017 manifesto to provide 5-marla plots and free houses to the homeless Dalit families, but did not fulfilled. “Even the 33 percent reservation of panchayat lands did not protect the constitutional rights of Dalits. That is why today the Dalit community’s campaign to question the political parties, especially the leaders of the ruling Congress, about their election promises is the right move,” they added.
The AAP leaders also referred to the post-matric scholarship scam and accused the government of discriminating against the Dalit community. They said that before the 2022 elections, the Aam Aadmi Party would unveil a detailed manifesto for this oppressed society under a road map.
