Congress serves five day ultimatum to Himachal Pradesh government

Party plans State-wide protest if the BJP government failed to solve water crisis.

Shimla: People wait to collect water from a tanker, as the city faces acute shortage of drinking water, in Shimla on Wednesday, May 30, 2018. (PTI Photo) (PTI5_30_2018_000116A)

The acute shortage of drinking water in the hill State, particularly in the captial town Shimla, had put the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) government on the back foot. Opposition parties were using the water crisis to embarrass the Jai Ram Thakur government here with the Congress on Thursday serving a five-day ultimatum to the government to solve the water crisis.

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State Congress Chief Sukhwinder Singh said that if the water scarcity was not solved within five days his party would block the highways all over the State and would stage protests He wanted to know why the Jai Ram government had not included the drinking waterin its hundred days priority agenda. He also demanded to know why the State IPH Minister had not anticipatde the water shortage problem. he

The Congress leader alleged that only the elite were getting regular water supply and the common man was still deprived of water despite the High Court intervention. “When there is a same government at the Centre and the State and even the municipal corporation is also controlled by the BJP, why this problem is lingering on for so long”, he asked.

On the other hand, a number of BJP councillors had sat on a protest in their wards or outside the MC office against their own government’s inefficiency. Ms Kimi Sud, Benmore councillor, Aarti Chauhan of Engine Ghar and Satya Kaundal of Sanjauli had raised issues against the government and had even demanded the resignation of their Mayor Kusum Sadret who had gone on a foreign tour amidst the huge water crises in the town. Rest of the BJP councillors stayed indoors as they were not able to face the wrath of the public.

Interestingly the Shimla DM Amit Kashyap on Thursday snapped the illegal water connection of a senior BJP leader and sitting MLA in the Jakhu locality of the main town. The BJP leader, a big builder was having some out of the way water connections and was getting a 24 hour supply despite a grave water shortage in the town.

The AAP members also staged a protest today in the main town and blamed the faulty distribution to be the main cause of this problem.

The government machinery in the State was now on its with the Prime Minister’s office seeking a report on the measures taken by the BJP administration to resolve the water crises.