Bidhuri wants CM sacked

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, DEC. 19. The national vice-president and spokesman of Lok Janshakti party, Mr. Ramvir Singh Bidhuri, today said that a delegation of the party under the leadership of Union Communications Minister, Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan, would soon meet the Prime Minister and demand dismissal of the Sheila Dixit Government for ``putting in peril the livelihood of lakhs of industrial workers and factory owners due to its faulty policies.''

Addressing a press conference here, Mr. Bidhuri also took the Chief Minister, Ms. Sheila Dixit, to task for failing to convene an all-party meeting on the closure of industries issue and adopt a common approach. ``A meeting of the Delhi MPs, leaders of various party and social organisations should have been convened for a consensus approach on the issue as it is involves the lives of lakhs of industrial workers and their families'', he added. But it is unfortunate the Chief Minister has no time for such consultations.

Stating the right through the Delhi Government, and particularly the Chief Minister, has been adopting a totally callous approach, Mr. Bidhuri said it is solely responsible for the chaotic conditions. Ms. Dixit never wanted the industries to remain in Delhi, he said and recalled that a few months after taking over, she had asked industrialists not to set up units in Delhi.

While on one hand Ms.Dixit had convened a special session of the Assembly to discuss the closure of industries, on the other the Chief Secretary was issuing orders for sealing industries in the non-conforming areas. This double speak will not absolve the Delhi Government of the responsibility which it has failed to discharge. The simple fact is that the Chief Minister herself is not interested in keeping the industries in Delhi.

Lashing out at the Government for having failed to develop the more than 1,500 acres at Bawana in the past two years, Mr. Bidhuri said that had this been done, the courts would not have taken such a serious view. Also, he said, people who had two installments for allotment of plots at alternate sites and whose applications had been accepted, their units should not be sealed or closed as it was the responsibility of the Government to rehabilitate them. They should not be made to pay for the failure of the State Government.

Mr. Bidhuri urged the court to take a lenient view of the situation and grant two years to the Delhi government to relocate industries in a time-bound manner. Till that time, the industries should not be uprooted. He also appealed to the Union Urban Development Minister, Mr. Jagmohan, to take a flexible stand and effect the necessary changes in the Master Plan of Delhi so that areas having more than 70 per cent industry could be declared industrial.

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