At Vidhan Sabha Tuesday. (Express Photo)
Addressing the Punjab Vidhan Sabha in the Budget Session, Punjab Governor V P S Badnore said Tuesday that Punjab was seriously concerned about “illegitimate demands” from neighbouring states for Punjab’s river waters and that no such transfer of water would be allowed.
In his speech, the Governor said that Punjab did not have surplus water and any attempt to transfer the waters of Ravi, Beas and Sutlej to any non-basin state would not be allowed. “My government is seriously concerned about some illegitimate demands and averments of our neighbouring states and it shall take all possible administrative and legal measures to protect the Punjab rivers,” he said.
Badnore said that the Punjab government was not against the interests of neighbouring states and was always willing to help them with good neighbourly gestures, but his government would not allow anyone to trample over Punjab’s inalienable rights over its river waters.
The Governor’s address also laid special emphasis on the issue of drugs smuggling and drug addiction in the state. He highlighted that being a border state, Punjab first suffered due to series of external aggressions by an inimical neighbour and later due to a decade of terrorism and was now fighting the national battle of “narco terrorism”.
Interestingly, the Governor’s address gave the same rationale of Punjab’s drugs problem as was given by the SAD-BJP regime when it was in power and said that being a transit state for smuggling of drugs and narcotics from across the international border, Punjab had suffered a large number of cases of drugs addiction.
He highlighted that the government had set up a Special Task Force to to apprehend drug traffickers and break the supply chain.
The Governor also touched upon the law and order issues in the state and said the government had taken stern action against all those involved in cases of sacrileges and killings of senior leaders of various communities. Special mention was made of the state police’s action against eight modules used in killings of Hindu, Christian as well as leaders of other communities.