Ahead Of PM Modi’s Punjab Visit, AAP Minister Demands Gangster Bishnoi’s Custody

With Punjab set to go to polls in early 2027, PM Narendra Modi’s visit to state capital and Union Territory Chandigarh on July 17 to inaugurate healthcare projects, a renovated railway station in Jalandhar, and flag off a train from Chheharta (Amritsar) to Varanasi seems to have rankled the ruling Aam Aadmi Party government. Predictably, the AAP leaders are miffed that Modi is stoking poll fever a bit too early. As a counter strategy, the AAP government has begun to endorse the bizarre U.S. line in the gangster Lawrence Bishnoi case. It has gone so absurd as to accuse the Modi government of deliberately ignoring Punjab and “aid a gangster, lodged in Sabarmati Jail of Gujarat, to spread his drug business in the state.” Punjab Health Minister Balbir Singh is upset that PM Modi will inaugurate health projects in Punjab. “The Centre is not even allowing our flagship health insurance scheme to be implemented in PGI, Chandigarh—a project set up for Punjab several decades ago. If this is not discrimination, what else is?” he said. 80% of drugs being smuggled from across the International Border are being dumped in the state. That is why new drugs like ICE and cocaine are increasingly coming into Punjab,” said Balbir Singh, on the sidelines of a press conference called to speak about the initiatives being taken by the AAP government to tackle the drug menace in Punjab. Bragging about AAP government’s capabilities to stem the rot, Singh  claimed that if only the “person sitting in the Sabarmati jail of a state which has a double-engine government is now accused by an international agency like the FBI of running a global drug racket “were to be  sent by the Centre  to a Punjab jail, “we will not only treat him but also reform him.”