Says, it was well scripted drama to avoid action against culprits
Points out, third bill in eight years, yet justice eludes in sacrilege case
CHANDIGARH, July 15 :
Punjab Congress president Amarinder Singh Raja Warring has accused the Aam Aadmi Party government in Punjab of playing with the sentiments of people by enacting a drama of passing a law against sacrilege and then referring it to a select committee.
“This is yet another ‘futile periodical exercise’ to bide time”, Warring said about the ‘Sacrilege Bill’ here today.
“If the government was really sincere, it should have acted on the SIT report gathering dust in its corridors”, he suggested, while remarking, “this is a clear attempt to divert the public attention and shield the culprits”.
He said, the government has only tried to divert the attention from bringing real culprits to book and postponing the matter for an uncertain period.
Warring asked if the bill was to be referred to a select committee and what was the point in presenting it before the house. “This was just an exercise to fool the people of Punjab and bide time”, he observed.
Asserting that people were fed up with such periodical exercises of enacting “strict laws” without meaning anything, he pointed out, “it has been ten years since the sacrilege was reported for the first time in 2015 and since then we have had three governments and three laws without anyone getting punished”.
He noted that the AAP was just treading the beaten track, without any seriousness and sincerity to do justice in the case. “The Akali-BJP government passed a law in 2016. The Congress government passed the second law in 2018. And now the AAP government has passed the law for the third time in 2025 and postponed it further on the pretext of public consultation”, he pointed out, while observing, this is just an exercise in running away from the issue.
Warring said, given the past experience about the laws being passed and sent for presidential assent, this law, even if passed after six months may take a few years to be implemented.
“The government has given six months to the select committee without any condition that its time will not be extended further”, he said, while adding, “even if the process is completed in the stipulated period, it will take more time for its passage and then it will go to the Governor and eventually to the President of India and all of us know how much time the entire process will take and that too if no objections are queries are raised”