BJP MLA files case against Akali leader

CHANDIGARH: Everything is not fine between coalition partners SAD and BJP ��� not at ground zero at least.
The strain is already showing. Things got so bad during the run up to panchayat samiti and zila parishad polls on May 12 that SAD working committee member Narinder Singh Vada hurled choicest Punjabi abuses and casteist remarks at BJP's Dalit legislator from Dina Nagar, Sita Ram Kashyap.
Angry at the insult, the MLA promptly headed to the police station and slapped a case under the SC/ST Act against Vada and two others on Friday evening.And though no arrests have been made as yet, the BJP rank and file are rallying around its senior party leader and clamouring for action.
''We have expressed our anguish to chief minister Parkash Singh Badal as well as other Akali leaders and are awaiting a response and action against the culprits at the earliest,'' said Balbir Punj, the BJP's national general secretary who is also Punjab affairs in-charge.
Not surprisingly, the SAD leadership tried hard to underplay the whole incident. Party general secretary Daljit Cheema said he had been making concerted efforts to resolve the issue amicably. ''But the party won't interfere in the due process of law,'' he said when asked why no arrests had been made so far.
The police, on its part, denied it was under political pressure from the senior member in the ruling coalition.