Punjab CM Amarinder Singh on Wednesday accused SAD MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal of involvement in the imposition of the Centre's farm laws while saying her party could have averted the crisis when it was part of the Union government.
The Bathinda MP had on Tuesday accused the CM of speaking the language of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre by allegedly suggesting that the farmers'' stir is hampering the state's economic development.
Ms Badal had quit the Union government after her party snapped its ties with the BJP over the farm laws.
"No Akali leader, especially former Union Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal, had the moral right to speak on the crisis triggered by the farm laws, which they could easily have averted when they were part of the central government," said CM in a statement on Wednesday.
Ridiculing Ms Harsimrat's remarks, the CM said farmers would not have even reached the Delhi borders to make their voice heard had it been left to the ruling party at the Centre and in neighbouring Haryana.
"I never asked farmers to go to Delhi. They were forced to leave their homes and sit at the border of the national capital, facing the elements and even losing their lives as a result of your coalition government's acts of commission and omission," he said.
He asked Ms Harsimrat to stop "lying about her brazen complicity in the imposition of the farm laws on the farmers, not just of Punjab but the entire country".
Dubbing as "atrocious" Ms Harsimrat's suggestion that the farmers should protest in Punjab the CM said, "It's like asking someone to go to the western front to fight an enemy that is standing at the eastern border."
It was evident that the Akalis were trying to divert the farmers' attention from the Centre to the state, with an eye on the Assembly polls, he said.
Taking a dig at Ms Harsimrat's claim of being "surprised and pained" at his remarks, the CM said either the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leader was "deliberately lying or was totally dumb and apathetic to the plight of the state and its people".
"It's a joke coming from the leader of a party that misruled Punjab for 10 years and brought the state to the brink of complete ruination," he said, asking Ms Harsimrat where her pain had disappeared for those 10 years when the SAD-BJP government was "inflicting one injury after another on the people with their corrupt acts".
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