Amarinder rejects any move to alter status of Panjab University

Rejecting outright any move to change the present status of Panjab University, Chandigarh, Chief Minister Amarinder Singh has written to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, saying his government was open to increasing the grant-in-aid for the varsity through a mutually consultative process.

In the demi-official letter written, the chief minister asserted that the Haryana government could not take advantage of the ongoing proceedings in the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

"The transitory financial resources problem and its resolution by the statutory stakeholders do not permit the Government of Haryana to turn back the clock," he wrote, according to an official statement today.

Notably, Amarinder Singh's Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar had earlier this month urged the central government for restoration of Haryana's share in Panjab University, Chandigarh.

This had come days after Khattar reiterated Haryana's claim on Chandigarh, asking Punjab to consider making New Chandigarh as its capital.

Khattar had explained that the process of restoration of Haryana's share in the PU was required as over the years the composition and character of Chandigarh had evolved as a larger entity, that is 'tricity'.

Besides, a large number of students from Haryana take admission in various courses of the PU, he had said.

The proposal of the Haryana Government for restoration of the state's share in the university is "historically, logically, rationally and culturally unsustainable," wrote Amarinder Singh adding that "the state of Haryana cannot arrogate to itself the privilege of altering history as and when it wishes."