Chandigarh, Aug 8 Congress MP Pratap Singh Bajwa on Saturday once again demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the hooch tragedy in Punjab which has so far claimed 121 lives. He also favoured changing the leadership of his party's government.
"Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh has Excise and Taxation, Home and Police departments under him, still fingers are being raised at the Excise department," Bajwa told the media in Amritsar city.
"If justice has to be given to the 121 people who have died in the hooch tragedy then an investigation should be done by the CBI or the Enforcement Directorate (ED)," he said.
Bajwa said that the mining, liquor, cable, drugs and transport mafias, which came into existence during the rule of the Badals, are thriving under Captain Amarinder Singh's government.
"If the future of the Congress has to be safeguarded then we need to change the leadership in the state," he added.
Two days after Punjab Congress Chief Sunil Jakhar sought strict action against party MPs Bajwa and Shamsher Singh Dullo, the entire Punjab Cabinet also pitched in for the duo's expulsion for their "anti-party and anti-government activities", which they termed as "gross indiscipline".
The Cabinet Ministers, in a joint statement, called for cracking the whip on the two MPs without any laxity or delay.
Indiscipline cannot be tolerated at any time, least of all when Assembly elections are less than two years away, they said, pointing to the MPs' repeated attacks on the state government, including the Chief Minister.
Questioning their move of airing concerns about the hooch tragedy, the Ministers said these two MPs had never, during their Rajya Sabha term, bothered to raise any issue of interest to the state they represent.
( With inputs from IANS )