Congress leader Amarinder Singh today rejected the ruling SAD's charge that his party was masterminding 'Sarbat Khalsa' and accused it of trying to "deflect public attention" from desecration and killing of peaceful protesters in Punjab.
The government failed to identify the culprits behind the sacrilege and punish officers responsible for killing of two peaceful protesters. Now it has "fabricated and electronically doctored" the voice records in a crude attempt to put the entire blame on the Congress and trying to deflect public attention, he said.
The Deputy leader of Congress in Lok Sabha was referring to the conversation transcripts played by SAD yesterday where some party leaders purportedly were in conversation with Sikh hardline group United Akali Dal leader assuring him to mobilise crowd for the congregation.
Yesterday, SAD accused certain Congress leaders of masterminding the 'Sarbat Khalsa' on November 10 and asked Rahul Gandhi to take action against its leaders "for participating and helping in organising the congregation."
Reiterating his charges against Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal over his continued silence, the Deputy Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha said, "He has proved himself to be a coward who runs away like a fugitive instead of facing the situation that is of his own making."
"You will do better if you start looking within and recognise and realise as why so many people attended the Sarbat Khalsa instead of trying to find its origins in 10, Janpath or Moti Bagh Palace", he said in a statement here.
Amarinder alleged that Sarbat Khalsa may have been hijacked by a handful of radicals, but the huge participation of people was an expression of deep anger against the Badals.
"It was hatched in every house across Punjab hit and hurt by your misgovernance, graft, failure in agriculture, closure of industry, drug smuggling, loot of the state, subversion of the SGPC and Akal Takhat authority, desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib, killing of peaceful protestors and framing of innocent youth in false cases," he said.
The ex-Punjab Chief Minister said, Parkash Singh Badal had virtually "abandoned his authority and responsibility" as the head of the government.
"Badal is either a coward or has lost his power to think, speak and act as otherwise it is difficult to explain his hibernation for that long," he said.
Pointing out how one of Badal's ministers was not allowed to lay the foundation stone at his own Assembly segment in Bathinda district yesterday, Amarinder said, the CM had himself gone "underground into hiding" leaving his ministers and other leaders at "the mercy of crowds".
