In view of the Panchayat elections to be held on October 15, today Amritsar MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla reached BDPO office for surprise inspection. When MP Aujla reached Rani Ka Bagh office of Block Verka at 12.45 and did not find the secretary on the seat, he along with other Congress leaders staged a sit-in protest there.
He alleged that the secretary, BDO, BDPO are working under the pressure of the state government and are pushing people openly. Then after the arrival of SDM, the sit-in was called off but at the same time a warning was given that if the situation does not improve, then a sit-in will be held at a bigger level.
MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla said that since morning people are coming to his office complaining that the secretary is not at his seat due to which they are not able to get the receipt of Chulha Tax. There are many flaws in the voter lists. Votes of many people have been cancelled and many people have died for years but their names are still in the voter list but when people reach the BDPO office to solve all these problems, the officers are not present.
He said that the complaints of all the blocks are the same. He said that at present all the officers are officers of the Election Commission. MP Aujla alleged that the government is saying that this is a fair election and elections will be held without any discrimination but it itself has made all the MLAs election officers without any announcement which is dictatorship.
He said that everyone has the right to vote but if we talk about Amritsar only, then around 50,000 votes have been cancelled here. In many villages, the votes of the current Sarpanch were cancelled. MP Aujla said that as per the instructions, elections will be held according to the voter lists of 2017, whereas in 2017, the number of votes in a village was 1945, whereas according to the lists of 2023, 945 votes have been cut, for which no officer is present on the seat to give account and people are constantly getting pushed around.
MP Aujla was accompanied by former MLA Sunil Dutti, former chairman of Improvement Trust Dinesh Bassi, former councilor Vikas Soni, former Panch and Sarpanch of many villages, who staged a sit-in protest at the BDPO office for about 3 hours and raised slogans against the Punjab government. After this, SDM reached the spot and MP Aujla warned him that if the problems of the people are not solved, he will surround the DC but will not leave the people alone.
After the protest ended, MP Aujla said that tomorrow on Tuesday, he will visit Attari at 11 am, Chogawan at 12.30 pm, Ajnala at 2 pm and Majitha assembly constituency at 3.30 pm to solve the problems of the people who are facing difficulties in filing nomination papers for the Panchayat elections.