E-Paper
Transfer of Chandigarh: Haryana trying to complicate the issue, says SAD
SAD said it was unfortunate that Haryana legislative assembly was trying to complicate the issue of the transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab by passing resolutions instead of demanding a separate capital for the state
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Tuesday said it was unfortunate that the Haryana legislative assembly was trying to complicate the issue of the transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab by passing resolutions instead of demanding a separate capital for the state.
Reacting to the resolution passed by the Haryana assembly in which it asserted its right over Chandigarh, Satluj Yamuna Link (SYL) canal and the transfer of Hindi-speaking areas from Punjab, senior SAD spokesperson Daljit Singh Cheema said, “All these issues have already been settled. Raking them now will only result in ill will between Punjab and Haryana. The Haryana assembly should have acted responsibly and put the injustice meted out to Punjab on record on these issues besides urging the Centre to allocate funds if needed for the establishment of a new capital. Doing anything else amounts to playing to the galleries”.
He added that it’s a universally accepted norm that the parent state retains the capital. “This was also accepted during the reorganisation of the states in 1966. Chandigarh was retained as the capital of Punjab and Haryana only as an ad hoc arrangement. This was reiterated by the Rajiv-Longowal accord which even laid down a deadline of January 26, 1986, for the transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab. The same was even ratified in Parliament so there can be no ambiguity on this issue at all.”
Speaking about the issue of the SYL canal, Cheema said the first discrimination against Punjab was done in 1955 when a larger share of Ravi-Beas waters was allocated to non-riparian states by the then Congress government.
According to Cheema, Punjab had been consistently asserting that only it had rights over its river waters as per the riparian principle. “Besides this, there is a change in water availability and we don’t even have one drop of water to spare. Moreover, there is no land for construction of the SYL canal as the same has been handed back to the farmers by the erstwhile SAD government,” he added.
Speaking on demand for Hindi-speaking areas of Punjab to Haryana, Cheema said repeated commissions, including the Desai Commission and the Venkatramaih Commission, could not find any continuous Hindi-speaking area for transfer from Punjab to Haryana.
