Urges Bhagwant Mann to take up the issue with the centre at once

Chandigarh – Senior congress leader & Punjab’s leader of the opposition (LoP), Partap Singh Bajwa has demanded that the union government led by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) should immediately transfer Chandigarh to Punjab.

He urged the Bhagwant Mann government to strongly take up the issue of Chandigarh with the union government as it has been an integral part of Punjab ever since it was built.

Bajwa even suggested that Bhagwant Mann may call an all party meeting of the various political parties without further delay to resolve the issue for once and for all.

Bajwa said feeble and weak statements by the cabinet ministers of the AAP government would not work as Haryana was in a habit of raising the issue of Chandigarh every now and then creating confusion and chaos among the minds of the people residing in both Punjab & Haryana as well as in Chandigarh.

Bajwa said Bhagwant Mann after the Gujarat elections were over should immediately seek transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab which has been given the status of union territory (UT) nearly 56 years ago.

Bajwa said it was a well known historically established fact that land of many villages of Punjab had been acquired to build Chandigarh as the capital of Punjab.

Chandigarh continued to be the capital of Punjab till the division of the state in 1966. There was no demand from any quarter for carving a UT out of Punjab. The successive governments of the day at center promised to transfer Chandigarh to Punjab but failed to live up to their words due to petty politics.

Punjab was the only state in the entire country after being bifurcated into two separate states deprived of its original capital.

Bajwa said enough politics has been played over the status of Chandigarh and now it was time for the union government to immediately transfer the capital to its original owner without further delay.