‘Afghan heroin destroying Punjab’ chief minister says

Jalandhar: Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal has blamed heroin coming from Afghanistan for destroying the youth in the state.

Breaching protocol where such issues are taken up at government-to-government level, Badal stunned the visiting Afghan President Hamid Karzai and others by turning to him mid-way through his speech.

“Mr Karzai, all heroin coming to Punjab comes from Afghanistan. I request you to stop it. Drugs are affecting us in a big way,” Badal said on Monday while addressing a convocation ceremony of the private Lovely Professional University (LPU) at Phagwara town.

While Karzai chose not to respond, Badal’s request is being seen as a complete U-turn of his Shiromani Akali Dal (Sad) and virtual admission that a large number of youths in Punjab are addicted to drugs.

Sad had reacted nastily to the senior Congress party leader Rahul Gandhi’s statement made in October last year, in which he said that seven out of 10 young people in the state are addicted to drugs. “What is happening to human resources in Punjab? Seven out of 10 youths have the problem of drugs,” Rahul had said, while addressing students of Punjab University.

Various studies have shown that drug addiction has become a major problem in the northern state, as nearly 70 per cent of the youth are afflicted.

Sad had gone to the extent of accusing Rahul and his brother-in-law Robert Vadra of taking drugs themselves. “Rahul Gandhi and Robert Vadra should undergo a dope test to prove that they are not addicts before making such comments about Punjab’s youth. Rahul Gandhi must apologise to the youth for his humiliation,” senior Sad leader Prem Singh Chandumajra had said while Badal’s son and the state’s deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal blamed the federal government for its failure to stop drug smuggling at the border.

The Punjab chief minister went beyond the request to the Afghan President Karzai, by saying drugs produced in Afghanistan enter India through Pakistan and is then supplied to the rest of the world.

Karzai was at the LPU campus to receive an honorary doctorate. Its 30,000 students are from 26 countries including Afghanistan. Indian President Pranab Mukherjee was the chief guest while Punjab governor Shivraj Patil presided over the convocation.

Karzai, in his acceptance speech addressed the underlined need for India to contribute to the academic development in his war-ravaged country, currently undergoing a phase of reconstruction in which India is playing the major role.

The presence of the two Presidents on the dais of a private university was historic. Indian President Mukherjee underlined the need to redefine education in his speech saying every year around 12 million Indians are added to the working population of the world. “By 2020 two-third of the working population will be in India. It would be great asset if it’s a productive asset. It will be great liability if we don’t instil the skills required for employment,” Mukherjee said.

President Mukherjee expressed his unhappiness that not even one of the Indian universities was included in the 200 top universities of the world while recalling how students from all over the globe travelled to India to study at Takshashila and Nalanda universities in the past.

Mukherjee, while agreeing that there was a shortage of quality teachers in the country, suggested using technology and introducing the concept of the e-class and other out-of-the-box innovative measures to improve the quality of education.

The President gave gold medals to 20 students. In all, 123 toppers got citations of commendation and 8,501 undergraduates, postgraduates and M. Phil degrees were distributed to students for LPU’s 215 programmes.