No alliance between Akali Dal, BJP: SAD leader Virsa Singh Valtoha
Sep 16, 2023
Chandigarh (Punjab) [India], September 16 : Senior Akali Dal leader Virsa Singh Valtoha dispelled rumours of an alliance between his party and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
"I am a soldier of Akali Dal and I am a member of their core committee. Even today I had a talk with Pradhan ji (Sukhbir Badal). There is no alliance between Akali Dal and Bharatiya Janata Party," Valtoha said on Saturday, speaking to ANI.
Hitting out at the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Valtoha said, "Aam Aadmi Party spokesperson Malvinder Singh has only political intentions...How can Akali Dal tickets be decided by another party?"
Slamming AAP for joining hands with the Congress in the INDIA alliance, he said, "You used to say that Congress has looted the country. You used to speak against Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Captain Amrinder Singh..today you have formed an alliance with them, the enemy of country. The Congress party has been an enemy of Punjab. This means you too are our enemy."
Speaking on the Kotkapura firing incident, the Akali Dal leader said, "We have been saying that investigations should be done. The way the incident has been politicised and false propaganda spread, it has harmed the Akali Dal. However, we are saddened by the fact that you are questioning the Shiromani Akali Dal which is behind religion, faith, truth itself."
"Today the Special Investigation Team (SIT) has enlisted the videos (of the incident) and made it part of the judicial record where everything has been clear that those demonstrators who were peaceful were beaten up. The firing was done by some demonstrators who took the rifles from the police," he said.
Incidents of theft of the 'bir' (copy) of the Guru Granth Sahib, putting up of handwritten sacrilegious posters and torn pages of the holy book being found in Bargari had triggered protests in Faridkot in 2015.
On the directions of Punjab and Haryana High Court Chandigarh, the State Government had constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT) consisting of three Senior officers including ADGP LK Yadav, IG Rakesh Agrawal, and SSP Moga Gulneet Singh Khurana to investigate the Kotkapura firing incident.
