Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today refuted Amarinder Singh's allegations that ministers were feeling "suffocated" in the SAD-BJP government as power had been "concentrated" within the Badal family, and charged the Congress leader with making "baseless" statements.
Asking Singh to refrain from "misleading" people through his "irrational and baseless" statements, Badal said the Deputy Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha "lacks substance" and makes "false" claims habitually to "score brownie points".
Badal, during Sangat Darshan programme in Baba Bakala Assembly segment here, asked former chief minister Singh to desist from "stooping too low" for the sake of publicity.
He said Singh had been levelling such allegations for long but not even one charge had been proven correct. The former chief minister has not learnt any lesson from the past and was trying to befool the people by "relentlessly" issuing "irrelevant" statements.
"I avoid mudslinging against even my bitter political foes as it is against my ethics," Badal said.
"Total power has been concentrated within the Badal family and ministers cannot even think of transferring a class IV employee without their (Badals') permission... Well, the way situation is building up, it seems both the partners are waiting for an opportunity to call it off and also preparing for it," Singh had said earlier this week.
On the allegations of drug trade against state BJP Chief Kamal Sharma's aides, Badal said an inquiry was going on in this matter and law would take its own course.
Earlier addressing a gatherings during Sangat Darshan at Jullupur Kheda village, Pheruman, Umranangal and Beas besides Raiyya city, Badal slammed former Congress chief ministers alleging they ignored interest of the state and its people.
Badal said that while he was moving from village to village solving people's problems his predecessor Singh didn't "bother" to meet people during his stint as chief minister between 2002 and 2007.
Exhorting people not to get swayed by slogans of political parties, the Chief Minister said such parties mislead people by showing green pastures. He claimed whenever people had given chance to these parties they have failed miserably.
