No politics of vendetta, HP MLAs tell ex-CM

Shimla: Himachal Pradesh legislators on Wednesday denounced the statement of BJP leader and former Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, who said the Congress government is pursuing the politics of vendetta.

In a joint statement here, the legislators -- Rajesh Dharmani, Sanjay Rattan and Sunder Singh Thakur -- said "it appears the former Chief Minister is in a hurry to please his political bosses at New Delhi by resorting to such baseless statements".

They said the government, headed by Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, has been given a mandate by the people for five years and it is the commitment of the government to fulfill all 10 guarantees and other election promises made by the Congress ahead of the assembly elections in the five years. They said the previous BJP government in the fag-end of its tenure announced opening and upgrading of several institutions with an eye on the elections. All the institutions were opened and upgraded with a motive to woo voters without any budgetary provision.

They said not even a single institution was opened or upgraded on public demand. The government has decided to wind up such institutions and all these announcements would be reviewed, and if found to be viable and required, would be opened after making proper budgetary provision.

The legislators reminded the former Chief Minister that all development-oriented decisions of the previous Congress government were scrapped as the BJP came into power in the state. They said the BJP government always resorted to "politics of vendetta and vengeance", whereas the Congress government headed by Sukhu is committed to balanced development of the state.