Bhagwant Mann cabinet meeting in a while, may decide on giving 300 units of free electricity to the people of Punjab

Bhagwant Mann Cabinet Meeting: The meeting of the Bhagwant Mann cabinet of Punjab will start shortly. There can be many important decisions in this. The cabinet can decide to provide 300 units of electricity free to the people of the state every month and Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann can announce it. This issue may figure prominently in the agenda of the cabinet meeting.

Let us inform you that during the assembly elections, AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal had also given a guarantee of providing 300 units of free electricity to the people of the state when the AAP government came to power. There may also be a proposal to open a Mohalla Clinic in the cabinet meeting.

An agenda can also be brought to the meeting to not spend the money of the Rural Development Fund (RDF) on the loan waiver of farmers and laborers. Confirming this, a senior official of the department has said that whether to bring a bill in this regard or an ordinance will be decided in the cabinet meeting.

It is worth noting that the central government had raised objections last year on why the state government was spending the money of the Rural Development Fund on the loan waiver of farmers and laborers. If political parties have made promises of loan waiver, then they should spend it from the normal account. RDF is only for infrastructure development.

When the then state government did not take the objection of the central government seriously, they refused to pay Rs 1150 crore for the last paddy season. The central government has already done this. The then Finance Minister Manpreet Badal and former Food and Supplies Minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu also met Union Food and Supplies Piyush Goyal to take this stalled RDF.

After this, it was agreed between the leaders of both sides that the amount of RDF should not be spent on a loan waiver. Manpreet Badal had assured that the RDF Act would have to be amended for this and a bill would have to be brought for this.

Union Minister Piyush Goyal, while agreeing, then released 3500 crores of all other expenses including RDF, but the Finance Minister in his time did not introduce the RDF amendment bill in the assembly nor has issued an ordinance on it. Showing displeasure on this, the central government once again stopped the production of paddy RDF.