Amarinder alleges Badal pushing polls sops, asks EC to stop it

Alleging that the SAD-BJP government was trying to push "poll sops" through ordinances, Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh today urged the Election Commission to take immediate preventive steps.
He said Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal was trying to push poll sops through ordinances, which the Punjab Governor has refused to sign, and he wants to push through now in the special assembly session convened "in violation of all norms".
Badal has convened a special session of the state assembly from December 19.
"Having failed to push its poll sops through the Raj Bhavan, the Badal government is now resorting to a 'back-door' special session of the state assembly, which it has deliberately scheduled for December 19, since media reports indicate the EC might announce the poll dates and impose the code of conduct on December 20," Amarinder said.

He said there were reports that the Badal government would try to pass at least eight bills/ordinances, including the one related to regularisation of 27,000 contractual employees, who have been agitating against the government for some time.
"It was clearly a clandestine bid by the Akalis to bypass the electoral process," he alleged.

Amarinder described as unfortunate Punjab Governor's decision to allow the special assembly session after having refused to sign the ordinances citing irregularities.
He lamented the fact that the governor had even gone ahead to allow the special session to take up certain money bills, saying the entire exercise amounted to gross electoral indiscretion.

The Punjab Congress chief urged the governor to withdraw his permission and not allow this travesty of electoral norms, pointing out that "legislations passed by the Badal government in this surreptitious way would not stand judicial scrutiny".
He compared this with the manner in which it had taken certain actions, including holding a similar special session on November 16 on the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal issue. All those actions, he said, has since been exposed to Supreme Court scrutiny.
The legislations that Badal government is seeking to pass through the special session of the House would also be open to similar scrutiny, he warned, adding it was clear that the Badals were simply trying to befool people of Punjab.