Amid reports of Centre asking the Punjab government to pay up Rs 6.35 crore for the deployment of paramilitary forces in the State during and after the terror attack in Pathankot air force base, AAP MPs Bhagwant Mann and Sadhu Singh have asked the Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh to deduct the amount from their MPLAD funds.
In a letter to Mr. Singh, Mr. Mann, the parliamentary party leader of the AAP in Lok Sabha, said Punjab is already reeling under the debt of Rs 1.5 lakh crore.
“Punjab has made maximum sacrifice in country’s freedom fight. This year, neither the Sikh Regiment nor the tableau of Punjab found place in the Republic Day Parade.
“If you don’t consider Punjab as part of India or if you don’t consider the Pathankot terror strike as an attack on country, then as MP from the state I would request you to please deduct Rs 6.35 crore from our MPLAD funds,” Mr. Mann said on Wednesday.
The Punjab government had refused to pay the bill. In a communication to the Centre, the state government had said that the deployment of these units was in “national interest” and “expenditure thereon should not be billed to the state government”, officials said here.
NDA constituents Shiromani Akali Dal and BJP are in power in Punjab.
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