De­mand­ing a com­pre­hen­sive ju­di­cial en­quiry into the multi-mil­lion Ru­pees scam in the dis­per­sal of Pre-Ma­tric and Post-ma­tric schol­ar­ship funds to poor and needy Dalit stu­dents in the In­dian state of Pun­jab, Kendri Sri Guru Singh Sabha and a con­glom­er­ate of Sikh schol­ars in Chandi­garh have sec­onded the Pun­jab Bandh Call on 10 Oc­to­ber given by Dalit or­gan­i­sa­tions and the Sant Samaj.

Obfus­cat­ing pub­lic funds, mis­ap­pro­pri­at­ing by us­ing it for ex­pen­di­tures other than those in­tended by law or by ex­ec­u­tive or­der are means gen­er­ally adopted by the In­dian Union gov­ern­ment and by var­i­ous state gov­ern­ments. The schol­ar­ship scam has be­come a huge scan­dal as it is widely al­leged and the even the Chief Sec­re­tary of the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment had taken cog­ni­sance of the same.

De­spite protests by var­i­ous op­po­si­tion par­ties, spear­headed by the Lok In­saaf Party of the Bains broth­ers, the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment has re­fused to ex­am­ine the records into the 55 mil­lion INR scam in ‘non-dis­burse­ment of pal­try schol­ar­ship funds for Dalit Stu­dents from 2017 on­wards’ given to the state by the Union gov­ern­ment. It is an­other mat­ter that Chief Min­is­ter Pun­jab is shield­ing the al­legedly guilty So­cial Wel­fare Min­is­ter Sadhu Singh Dharam­sot.

Schol­ars Prof. Sukhdev Singh Sirsa, Gen­eral Sec­re­tary Kendri Pun­jabi Lekhak Sabha, Prof. Sarab­jit Singh, For­mer Pres­i­dent Kendri Pun­jabi Lekhak Sabha, Gurtej Singh IAS, Ajay­pal Singh Brar -au­thor, Ra­jwinder Singh Bains, Se­nior Ad­vo­cate Pun­jab and Haryana High Court, Dr Kuldip Singh Pa­tiala, Gur­preet Singh, Pres­i­dent, Global Sikh Coun­cil, Gur­bachan Singh, Ed­i­tor Des Pun­jab, Prof Man­jit Singh, For­mer Head of Dr Ambed­kar Chair Pun­jab Uni­ver­sity Chandi­garh, Dr Pyare Lal Garg, Jas­pal Singh Sidhu, Sukhdev Singh Sidhu Se­nior Jour­nal­ists, Surinder Singh Kis­han­pura, kendri Singh sabha Chandi­garh, Sant Sar­wan Das. Sant Parshotam Lal, Sant Surinder Das, Sant Ja­gir, Singh, Sant Satwinder Hira and Gur­cha­ran Singh Ram­garh, Savid­han Bachao An­dolan Bharat are sig­na­to­ries to the en­dorse­ment call.

While speak­ing to WSN, Gur­preet Singh, the Pres­i­dent of the Global Sikh Coun­cil said, “We also de­mand a ju­di­cial in­quiry into the dis­per­sal of schol­ar­ships from 2011 to 2019 to un­earth the scam which in­volved ac­tive col­lu­sion of Pun­jab gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials, politi­cians and man­age­ment of 1650 pri­vate ed­u­ca­tional in­sti­tutes. ”

“The in­volve­ment of the Union Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials is also ap­par­ent, as oth­er­wise, a scan­dal of such a mag­ni­tude could not have been pos­si­ble,” he added.

“We also con­demn the ex­on­er­a­tion of con­cerned Pun­jab min­is­ter with­out fix­ing the re­spon­si­bil­ity of any in the state gov­ern­ment in­quiry or­dered by the Chief Min­is­ter.”

Dr Pyare Lal Garg

It is re­ally said that “nearly a hun­dred thou­sand stu­dents of Pun­jab may have lost their chance of higher stud­ies, as the post-ma­tric schol­ar­ship which was first wholly funded by the Union gov­ern­ment is now sup­posed to be par­tially funded by the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment, said Sant Ja­gir, Singh.

Won­der­ing by the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment would at­tempt to hush up such a huge scan­dal in a cal­lous and un­eth­i­cal man­ner, speak­ing on be­half of the team of schol­ars, Dr Pyare Lal Garg. “We also con­demn the ex­on­er­a­tion of con­cerned Pun­jab min­is­ter with­out fix­ing the re­spon­si­bil­ity of any in the state gov­ern­ment in­quiry or­dered by the Chief Min­is­ter.”