Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu during their visit to the Kedarnath temple (ANI)

CHANDIGARH: Navjot Singh Sidhu announced on Friday that he was withdrawing his resignation as Punjab Congress chief, albeit with a rider: he will resume charge of the PPCC office the day a new advocate general takes over and a new panel (with the name of the new DGP) is named.
Sidhu attacked his own party’s “90-day government”, led by Charanjit Singh Channi, over progress made on two key issues — sacrilege and drugs. He also questioned the delay in making public the STF report on drugs.
Sidhu had resigned as PPCC chief on September 28, objecting to the Channi government appointing APS Deol as AG and Iqbal Singh Sahota as DGP.
Questioning the alleged delay in making the STF’s report public, Sidhu said, “When the CM was replaced, this was a key issue. It’s been 44-50 days, who stops you? What interest has the present government shown in getting justice on the sacrilege issue and making the STF report public? If you don’t have the courage to make the STF report public, give it to me, the party, and I will do it. The high command has no objection, it was a part of AICC’s agenda for Punjab,” he said.
Sidhu said that the DGP issue was supposed to have been settled in a week’s time “more than a month ago”. “But two panels later, it is still lingering. It is a government of 90 days and 50 days have passed. What is going on,” Sidhu said. “I have taken back my resignation,” he said, adding, “It was not any personal ego, it was the question of party worker’s honour”.
“When the police case of sacrilege in Bargari was registered in 2015, Saini picked his blue-eyed boy, Iqbal Singh Sahota, to head the SIT. Then, sitting with the then deputy CM, Sukhbir Singh Badal, Sahota gave a clean chit. That blue-eyed boy then becomes DGP of Punjab. That is the big question… Are these the only officers you could find,” he said.
He added that the lawyer who got blanket bail for Saini and told the courts that there was no faith in the Congress government had been advocate general. Sidhu also sought to remind the present Congress government of its claims on the sacrilege issue over the last four years that they did not have faith that the issues would be addressed under former CM Amarinder’s leadership. “I have been reminding Channi about these issues. Who was the torchbearer in exposing the drugs and sacrilege issue? It was Rahul Gandhi,” he said.
“It is not my personal fight. It was the demand of the party. The day these two are removed, every worker will turn into your star campaigner in every street. That is the spirit it will infuse in him. Otherwise, how will we face the voters,” he said.