Chandigarh, March 27: Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Tuesday said his government would deal with gangsters with an iron hand if they did not surrender.
Replying to the debate on the motion of thanks to the Governor’s address in the Vidhan Sabha, the Chief Minister appealed to the gangsters to lay down arms, warning that his government knew otherwise, how to deal with them.
Nobody would be allowed to vitiate the atmosphere of Punjab, said the Chief Minister, pointing to the various steps taken by his government to improve law and order, which had totally collapsed under the previous regime.
The Halqa system had been abolished and the government followed a policy of no political interference in civil and police functioning, said the Chief Minister.
Of the 32 cases of sacrilege, 22 had been solved, he said, adding that the fact that no such incident had taken place since the Congress government took over suggested political involvement of the previous ruling party.
The Justice Ranjit Singh Commission inquiry into the sacrilege cases was near completion, he said, rejecting Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia’s request that the investigation into these cases be handed over to a retired Supreme Court judge since Justice (Retd) Ranjit Singh had links with Leader of Opposition Sukhpal Singh Khaira.
Justice Ranjit Singh was an outstanding judge, said Captain Amarinder Singh, adding that all Jats had relationships embedded within many families, and if the government started taking all those into account it would not be able to find good people for carrying out its work.
As a sign of marked improvement in law and order, and policing, the Chief Minister pointed out that the police had busted eight modules involved in targeted killings in the state, besides eliminated gangs of criminals created or promoted during 10 years of SAD-BJP government As many as 707 gangsters had been arrested, he added.
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