CHANDIGARH: To the displeasure of Haryana government, Punjab governor Shivraj Patil has raked up the issue of Punjab’s claim over Chandigarh during his speech in the state assembly.
Patil in speech has told the assembly that “Chandigarh and several other Punjabi-speaking areas have been kept out of the state and must be transferred back at the earliest.”
Reacting sharply to Patil’s statement Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda told the Times of India that Punjab government was in the habit of misleading people.
“Chandigarh belongs to Haryana and there is no doubt about it as the Shah commission in 1966 had decided the fate of the city in favour of our state,” said Hooda.
He added that rather Haryana should be given its share of water as even the apex court has given its verdict on SYL in favour of the state.
Terming Patil’s statement as unfortunate, Indian National Lok Dal chief Om Prakash Chautala said in a statement that Haryana would not give up its claim on Chandigarh till Punjab Hindi-speaking areas including Abohar, Fazilka and nearby 107 villages were transferred to Haryana.
Chautala added that Patil being the constitutional head of Punjab should not have given this controversial unnecessary statement.
It’s not for the first time that claim has been staked over Chandigarh, a city designed by French architect le Corbusier.
Both Punjab and Haryana have been at loggerheads not only over water but also over Chandigarh and have been demanding to make the city their capital.
Most recently, Punjab deputy chief minister Sukhbir Badal had raised the issue at cm’s conclave in Delhi in February last year.
Sukhbir had told the chief ministers that Chandigarh had been denied to Punjab despite concrete assurances by the union government.
Punjab has also been opposing Haryana’s efforts to set up a separate high court for the state in Chandigarh terming it as an encroachment and Haryana on its part had asked Punjab to take the Punjab high court out of the city.
Some two years back Punjab CM Prakash Singh Badal had written to the law ministry saying that “Haryana should start moving its offices out of Chandigarh so that the UT can be transferred to Punjab.”
Haryana, on the other hand, has been demanding from the Union government to appoint Haryana governor as Chandigarh administrator, the highest administrative post of the union territory that has traditionally been given to the Punjab governor.
As per the Rajiv-Longowal accord of 1986, which was eventually stalled, Chandigarh was to go to Punjab and in return the state was to transfer Hindi-speaking areas of Abohar and Fazilka to Haryana.
Prior to this accord, Justice J C Shah commission, in its report submitted in 1966, when Haryana had come into existence, had recommended that Chandigarh should be a part of Haryana.
Source: Economic Times
