Zero tolerance to illegal mining: Badal

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today asserted that illegal mining of minor minerals would be dealt with severely and no one would be allowed to indulge in this unlawful practice.
On the sidelines of his Sangat Darshan programme in Ropar Assembly segment, he said he had already directed the SSP Ropar to take stock of the situation and all-out efforts should be made to put a stop to the menace.
He said severe of severest punishment would be meted out to those are involved in such illegal trade.
Badal said that by and large, mining activity was being carried out in a lawful manner in the region barring few incidents, which would also be checked closely in future.

On allegations levelled by Punjab Congress chief Amarinder
Singh of Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley targeting him, his family and especially his son Raninder by investigating agencies like Income Tax Department and Enforcement Directorate (ED), which were directly under his domain, he said "It is a sheer frustration on the part of Capt Amarinder to accuse anyone blindly rather he should be considerate enough to repose faith in the administrative system because ultimately truth will prevail.

Referring to objections raised by the Central Board of
Film Certification (CBFC) on the screening of Bollywood film 'Udta Punjab', Badal asked how the state government could be held responsible for it when the censor board was exclusively under the control of central government.

On accusations made by senior Congress leader Sunil Jakhar claiming Punjab government's misleading advertisements on central grants to the state, he said this was cheap politics. He added that if there was any crunch, the state would not have been able to give free power to the farmers worth Rs 5,000 crore annually besides launching several pro-farmer initiatives like free health insurance to provide free treatment to them up to Rs 50,000.
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Meanwhile, Amarinder accused Badal of playing "dirty and cheap" politics over the surgical strikes to "promote his political interests". He rejected Badal's allegations against him as ridiculous.

"No sane person would even think of taking these charges seriously for a minute," he said in a statement here this evening.
He was reacting to Badal's charges that he had endorsed Pakistan's stand on surgical strikes and the pre-emptive civil evacuation from the border areas.
"As a loyal ex-soldier of the Indian Army who has battled Pakistan at the borders, it is laughable to even think that I would ever contemplate favouring Pak stand over my own country," Amarinder said, adding he had stoutly backed the surgical strikes and stood by the Army's decision.
Amarinder asked Badal to show even single statement in which he had either opposed the army's action or favoured Pakistan's stand on the issue.

"I was among the first to advocate army action against Pakistan in the wake of the Uri terror attack," he declared.
"Either come out with some concrete evidence to support your charges or make a public apology," he demanded of Badal.
"It is people like Badal who are actually committing the unpardonable sin of dragging our armed forces into his own dirty political game for petty vested interests," he said.
However, he reiterated his view that the evacuation of residents from the border villages was "simply a tactic to whip up war hysteria and not at all necessary".
"No evacuation was undertaken during the 1965, 1971 and Kargil wars against Pakistan nor during the heightened tension at the time of Operations Brasstacks and Parakaram," he said.