: Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Thursday batted for stringent provisions in the anti-defection law in a bid to curb the rising tendency among leaders to switch party affiliations in an attempt to grab power.
“It was unfortunate that for the sake of power, the ‘turncoats’ are changing their political affiliations with every passing day,” said Mr. Badal at Kartarpur in Jalandhar, adding that this was a disgusting trend which needed to be checked by a strict anti-defection law, so that the mockery of democracy could be avoided.
‘Politics of opportunism’
Mr. Badal said that through the sheer display of the “politics of opportunism”, these “fugitives” not only back-stabbed their mother party but showed grave disrespect to the mandate of the people.
Exhorting people to teach the defectors a lesson by rejecting them in the upcoming Assembly elections, Mr. Badal said the voters were supreme. “I urge political parties to give a second thought while accepting turncoats from other parties,” he added.
Mr. Badal said that the switching between political parties by any individual hardly had any bearing on the polity of the State. The people were wise enough to exercise their franchise on the basis of principles rather than on the basis of caste or religion, he said.
