AAP candidate for Jalandhar Lok Sabha bypoll Sushil Rinku on Sunday paid obeisance at Nirmal Kutiya in Seechewal village here where environmentalist and AAP Rajya Sabha member Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal handed over to him a list of demands of the area that needs to be dealt with. The MP asked Sushil Rinku to make environment the main issue during his election campaign because people’s lives are in danger due to pollution.
The agenda contains seven major demands which will be sent to all the candidates of different political parties contesting the upcoming by-election.
One of the important demands is to stop the inflow of ‘toxic water’ into the various rainwater drains and rivers, including Kala Sanghian drain, Jamsher drain, Chitti Bein and Sutlej River.
Sushil Rinku assured that he will give priority to serious issues like environment. He said Punjab will always be indebted to him (Seechewal) for the service he has rendered to humanity in terms of environmental protection.
Seechewal has been handing over the environmental agenda to the candidates since 2009 Lok Sabha elections. Even after becoming a member of the Upper House, he continued with his crusade against environment pollution.
While addressing the gathering there, Seechewal shed some light on his observations as an environmentalist and how political leaders can take up the cause of environment conservation and bring a positive change in society.
Seechewal said that he will always keep tabs on environmental pollution and will continue to mobilise people to take up the cause.
The environmentalist said that people of Malwa and Rajasthan are suffering from cancer and other terrible diseases due to the discharge of dirty and polluted water in the Sutlej, the water of which is used for drinking purpose in Malwa and Rajasthan.
The parliamentarian demanded that 1,465 cusecs of water should be released into Bist Doab canal and an underground pipeline should be laid so that the canal water could reach every field under its area.
Seechewal said that he had visited all the effluent treatment plants of Punjab as a member of the monitoring committee formed by the Punjab Pollution Control Board and the National Green Tribunal, and most of these plants have been shut.
He made a strong pitch for building a metalled road on Dhusi Dam from Giddarpindi to Phillaur so that floods can be avoided.
