Congress legislators slammed the Punjab government's handling of the SYL (Sutlej-Yamuna Link) issue.
All Congress legislators today submitted their resignation to the Punjab Assembly Secretary today to protest the Supreme Court's ruling favouring Haryana on the Sutlej-Yamuna Link issue.
State Congress chief Amarinder Singh launched a fresh attack on Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, alleging Mr Badal has "failed to protect the interest" of the people and announced that his party will take out a rally on the issue on Sunday.
The 42 legislators, including leader of Opposition Charanjit Singh Channi, Sunil Jakhar, Sukhjinder Randhawa and Balbir Singh Sidhu, went to the Assembly here and submitted their resignations to Assembly Secretary Shashi Lakhanpal Mishra as Speaker Charanjit Singh Atwal was not present.
Senior Congress leaders, including Amarinder Singh, Partap Singh Bajwa and Ambika Soni accompanied the legislators.
"I will submit the resignations to the Speaker. He will see whether to accept them or not," Mr Mishra said.
A Congress spokesperson denied reports in a section of the media that they have submitted the resignations to the Governor.
Speaking to reporters, Captain Singh said, "I am not in Parliament and our MLAs are not in Vidhan Sabha. We will go to the people. We are going to burn the effigies of the government for not protecting Punjab's rights."
"We will hold a rally at the tail-end of the canal system in southernmost part of Punjab on Sunday, which will be affected (by the verdict)," he said.
Slamming Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, the state Congress chief asked, "Why is Badal not protecting Punjab's interests? Is it because he has made a lot of money and doesn't care what happens in his area?"
The water dispute took a new turn on Thursday with the Supreme Court holding as unconstitutional the 2004 law passed by Punjab to terminate the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal water sharing agreement with neighbouring states.
The judgement makes it clear that the Punjab Termination of Agreements Act, 2004 is "unconstitutional" and Punjab could not have taken a "unilateral" decision to terminate the water sharing agreement with Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi and Chandigarh.