Sukhu donates Rs 51L to HP flood relief fund
In a rare gesture, Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu recently donated Rs 51 lakh from his savings towards the ‘Aapda Rahat Kosh’ in which money is collected through crowdfunding to extend a helping hand to the disaster-affected people of the state. Sukhu and his wife Kamlesh Thakur presented the cheque of Rs 51 lakh to Chief Secretary Prabodh Saxena. The amount he donated includes his own savings as well as those of his wife and two daughters. So far, more than Rs 180 crore has been received in the Kosh. Now crorepati MLAs of the state are stuck with the same expectations.
Ex-Cong leaders form Punjab BJP core panel
While former chief minister Amarinder Singh is the core committee of the state unit of the BJP, his loyalists, former Congress leaders Rana Gurmeet Singh Sodhi, Raj Kumar Verka and Kewal Singh Dhillon, who had joined the saffron party, are in the core committee. Singh’s close relative Arvind Khanna is one of the vice presidents and his daughter Jai Inder Kaur was appointed president of Punjab BJP’s Mahila Morcha (women’s wing). As per political observers, the Patiala royal family still remains powerful in the state. First, it was in the Congress and now in BJP.
Haryana Cong MLA gets no support from party
Haryana Congress MLA Mamman Khan from Ferozepur Jhirka, who is presently in 14-day judicial custody after he was arrested in connection with the July 31 communal violence in the Nuh, seems to have no friends and supporters in the grand old party. As the loyalist of former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, he did not get support from the Hooda camp and the SRK (Selja, Randeep Surjewala and Kiran Chaudhary) group. The state congress did not utter a single word in his support. Only two other Muslim MLAs of the party — Aftab Ahmed from Nuh and Mohammad Illiyas from Punhana — termed his arrest as a political vendetta.
Harpreet Bajwa
Our correspondent in Chandigarh
hsbajwa73@gmail.com