Amarinder slams Badal govt for shutting down refugee camps

Punjab Congress President Amarinder Singh today accused the Badal government of shutting down the refugee camps in border areas and hit out, saying this is being done without making proper arrangements for displaced residents to return to their homes.
The residents, who were earlier forced to evacuate from their villages in the wake of growing tension at the border after India's cross-LoC surgical strikes in PoK, have now been rendered homeless, he said, adding people are now facing a harrowing time.
Singh said closure of camps by the government and withdrawal of Akali workers from there has left the displaced residents in the open, without a roof.

The move reflects the total apathy of the Badal government towards the people who were forcibly evacuated from the border villages, he said, adding the political dispensation was totally unconcerned about the plight of the poor people of the state.
While Badal and his team are busy in promoting their vested interests, lakhs of people around the state were being subjected to all kinds of hardships, said the former Punjab chief minister.
Residents of the border areas, in particular, were being subjected to all kinds of problems since being displaced from their villages in the midst of the war hysteria whipped up by the Badal government, said Singh.

From facing loss of their crops ready for harvesting, to becoming homeless, they were suffering a host of problems, all of which were of the Badal government's making, he added.