Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Saturday described as “atrocious” the Aam Aadmi Party’s accusation that he has a “secret” friendship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Chief Minister was reacting to AAP leader and Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia’s statement after Punjab was ranked number one in the Performance Grading Index 2019-2020 for school education by the Centre.
In a hard-hitting reply to the allegation, Capt.Singh said the AAP leadership is so “obsessed” with electoral politics that it saw poll conspiracies even in something as basic as school education.
The fact is that AAP, which “failed” to make a dent in Punjab’s political arena over the past over four years, can see the rout which it is facing in the 2022 Assembly elections, he said in a statement.
“Come to Punjab and I will show you around our schools,” Capt. Singh said, adding that the revamp of the State's schools was an exercise undertaken by his government as top priority and the ranking released by the Union Education Minister recently reflected the success of those efforts.
‘Jugalbandi’ invite
“If you are really interested in improving the education system of Delhi, may be you should do a ‘jugalbandi’ with me and I will teach you how to manage things better,” the Chief Minister replied to Mr. Sisodia’s charge.
Punjab Education Minister Vijay Inder Singla also hit out at his Delhi counterpart saying: “The desperation of Manish Sisodia was quite visible and understandable as paid clamour about the rosy picture of Delhi schools in media by the AAP government had comprehensibly been exposed. While Punjab got the top rank, Delhi has not been placed in top five....It has been placed on sixth position.”
Mr. Singla said the teachers and other staff of the Education department have worked hard to bring the State on the top position. “Punjab has emerged as a leading State in rejuvenating school education by being a pioneer in bringing in infrastructural development, qualitative improvement and complying with RTE norms in government schools,” he added.
Mr. Sisodia on Saturday raised strong questions against the report released by the Central government. “Crediting Punjab government with the best government schools in the country at a time when the State has seen the closure of more than 800 schools, and several schools found to be functioning as alcohol factories, is a farce. It is crystal clear that Captain Singh has the blessings of Modiji,” he said.
The Delhi Education Minister went on to say that quality education and learning has become a “joke” in Punjab government schools. “Modiji has released this report to hide the inadequacies in quality education of Punjab. Many children had to bear the brunt and parents had to transfer their children to private schools,” he said.
BJP flays AAP
Reacting to Mr. Sisodia’s allegations, the BJP said that the problem with the AAP leadership is that they are Delhi’s local leaders but wish to speak on every State’s politics, including that of Punjab, whose people have repeatedly rejected the party in every election after 2017.
“When a Central government report favours Delhi government, they claim credit for their work. Why then they try to discredit the Centre’s report which goes against them? Why did the Delhi government during the last six years push out 15 lakh weak students from Class IX and XI, forcing them to opt for NOIS schooling instead of helping them improve,” BJP spokesperson Harish Khurana asked.
(With inputs from PTI)
