The Tribune – Supporters of Tota Singh, Gill will ensure Jain’s defeat: Captain

Tribune News Service

Moga, February 18. Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) president Captain Amarinder Singh today claimed that the supporters of Akali leaders Tota Singh and PS Gill would ensure the defeat of SAD nominee Joginder Pal Jain in the Moga bypoll.

Addressing a gathering at Rattian village, Amarinder Singh mocked at Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal for his “desperate attempts” to convince Tota Singh and Gill to support turncoat Jain whom they had opposed in last year’s assembly elections.

Taking a dig at the Chief Minister for staying overnight with dissident and alienated Akali leaders in Moga in order to bring them on the track, Amarinder Singh advised him “not to waste time and energy at this age and better take care of his ailing health, lest he catches chest infection once more”.

“I can understand Badal’s tragedy because he is fighting a desperate battle for survival, though everybody knows well that he (Badal) was not keen to induct Jain into the party and field him in the bypoll,” he said. Amarinder Singh claimed that Tota Singh first bluntly refused Badal to campaign for Jain but later Badal urged him that for the sake of his honour and age, he (Tota Singh) should at least accompany him to public meetings even if he did not want his supporters to join Jain’s campaign.

“This is the reason why none of Tota Singh and Gill’s supporters are campaigning for Jain,” he said.

“Notwithstanding Badal’s bravado about his good health and being 90 per cent young, the matter of the fact is that he has been advised complete bed rest but was dragged out from bed to campaign in Moga by his son Sukhbir Badal to save him from an imminent defeat.”

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2013/20130219/punjab.htm#5

The Tribune – Fresh blow to Badal as Tota Singh sentenced to 1-year jail; Agri Minister held guilty for misusing official machinery; gets bail

Naveen S Garewal, Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 5. Just as the SAD-BJP government in Punjab was beginning to get out of the embarrassment caused by the conviction of its minister Jagir Kaur by a CBI court, Punjab’s Agriculture Minister Tota Singh was convicted today for misuse of official machinery by a Mohali court.

Tota Singh has been sentenced to one-year imprisonment and Rs 30,000 fine for misuse of official vehicles during his tenure as the Education Minister in 1997-2002 Akali government. Judge Rajinder Aggarwal of the Mohali court has, however, found him not guilty on charges of corruption.One year

The state Agriculture Minister applied for the bail and the court granted him to enable him to approach a higher court to challenge the conviction within 30 days. He also paid the fine immediately to save himself from an additional six-month jail term.

Though not found guilty of corruption, his conviction on a lesser charge is bound to result in his resignation and exit from the Punjab Cabinet. The Punjab Chief Minister, who was in Delhi to attend the chief ministers’ conclave on the NCTC, is expected to ask for his resignation on his return.

The SAD-BJP government in Punjab had sworn in on March 14. Within two weeks, it suffered the first blow when Jagir Kaur was sentenced to a five-year jail term in the Harpreet murder case. But even before the government gets on the track, it has suffered another jolt in the conviction of its agriculture minister.

Tota Singh was booked by the Vigilance Bureau during Amarinder Singh’s regime in 2002 under the Prevention of Corruption Act. He was accused of amassing disproportionate assets to his known sources of income. But the Mohali court did not find much merit and declared that Tota Singh was guilty only of misuse of official vehicles.

The Punjab Cabinet has strength of 18 ministers, including the CM. But after the resignation of Jagir Kaur, the CM has not filled her slot yet. With Tota Singh likely to demit office soon, Punjab is likely to witness a race for the vacant cabinet berths.

Meanwhile, the Congress has launched a tirade against the SAD saying that the courts were catching up with the “misdeeds of the Akalis”. Congress MP Partap Bajwa has said: “Akali Ministers’ past seems to be catching up with them with a vengeance.

After Bibi, another minister in a spot

Tota Singh is the second minister in the SAD-BJP coalition government in the state to be convicted and given a jail term after senior minister Bibi Jagir Kaur. Jagir Kaur was sentenced to five-year imprisonment by a CBI court in Patiala on March 30. She was sentenced recently in connection with a case relating to the mysterious death of her daughter.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2012/20120506/main3.htm