Punjab Cabinet approves life term for acts of sacrilege
With eye on the Assembly polls, it announces sops for various sections; BJP wants action against those found guilty of desecration of ‘Prana pratistha’ murtis
In the backdrop of incidents of the desecration of a scripture, the Punjab Cabinet on Thursday gave its nod to make the law more stringent, providing for life imprisonment as maximum punishment for those convicted for acts of sacrilege.
“The Cabinet gave its green signal to introduce a new amended Section 295 AA in the Indian Penal Code 1860, which would provide punishment of life imprisonment for offenders committing heinous acts of sacrilege of Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji.
“This step would act as a deterrent to prevent the recurrence of such unfortunate incidents in future. This amendment was all the more necessitated as the existing provisions of the said Act in Section 295, 295A and 296 though dealt with these matters but do not provide deterrent punishment for incidents related to sacrilege,” an official release giving details of the Cabinet decision, said here in the evening.
The maximum punishment in such cases earlier involved three years of imprisonment.
The Cabinet meeting was held under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal.
Welcoming the move, SAD’s alliance partner the BJP, said that they too had been demanding strict punishment for those found involved in acts of sacrilege involving the holy book.
“However, at the same time, we also want a similar law in place to deal with offenders who were found guilty of desecration involving the ‘Prana pratistha’ murtis (images/idols of gods),” BJP’s senior leader Tarun Chugh said.
‘Pran Pratishta’ refers to the ceremony by which a murti (image of a god) is consecrated in a temple.
Notably, Punjab has recently been rocked by a series of incidents of sacrilege involving the holy book.
The ruling SAD-BJP has been under attack from the opposition parties for failing to stop the acts of sacrilege as well as the degrading law and order situation in the State.
Jobs offered
Meanwhile, the Cabinet also offered government jobs to son of Krishan Bhagwan Singh and the brother of Gurjit Singh.
Both Krishan Bhagwan Singh and Gurjit Singh were killed during a protest against the incidents of desecration of holy book on October 14 at Faridkot.
With an eye on the State Assembly elections slated for early 2017, the Cabinet also announced sops for various sections, including a major recruitment drive, doubling of old age, handicapped and widow pensions, health insurance scheme for farmers, government jobs for next of kin of victims of Faridkot police firing victims, slashing VAT on dry fruits and LED lights, exempting the Gaushalas (cowsheds) from VAT, among other decisions.
In a bid to provide employment opportunities to the youth of the state, the Cabinet gave its nod for launching a major recruitment drive to fill 1,13,766 vacant posts in various departments.
The Cabinet directed the State government to complete the process of recruitment on these posts in a fast track mode, i.e. within a year.
Around 30,000 posts will be filled in school education, 39,821 in power sector, 5,301 in health department, 3,500 in agriculture, 4,566 in cooperation department, 2,198 in higher education, 2,072 in irrigation, 2,852 in PWD (B&R), 2,628 in revenue, 3,952 in transport and 1,584 in water supply and sanitation departments, the release said.
The Cabinet has decided to enhance old age pension, pensions for widow, destitute women, orphan children and disabled persons from Rs 250 to Rs 500 per month.
“This pro-poor initiative would provide far more social security to nearly 16.50 lakh beneficiaries, including elderly people, widows, dependent children and disabled persons and this decision would involve an additional financial liability of Rs 495 crore annually. Pensions henceforth would be disbursed through Panchayats. The new rates of pensions would be effective from January 1, 2016,” the release said.
The Cabinet approved the scheme ‘Mukhya Mantri Tirath Yatra Scheme’ for providing free pilgrimage services to sacred cities of Sri Nanded Sahib, Varanasi, Katra (Mata Vaishno Devi) and Ajmer Sharif.
The State government would organise free trains to these cities for the people from Punjab and also provide other logistic facilities to the pilgrims.
Under this ambitious scheme, 1,050 people from each Assembly constituency would be offered free travel facility to these pilgrimages. This scheme would be implemented from January 1, 2016 and the pilgrims would be served food during the travel without any charge.
The beneficiaries for the scheme would be identified by the respective Deputy Commissioners and the said scheme would entail an expenditure of Rs 186.82 crore. A Cabinet Sub-committee comprising of Tourism Minister, Education Minister and Transport Minister would monitor this scheme, the release said.
To provide better health care services to economically weaker sections of the society, the Cabinet decided to enhance the existing limit of free treatment in government and private hospitals to nearly 28.50 lakh blue card holders from Rs 30,000 to Rs 50,000 annually.
Apart from this in case of accidental death or incapacitation of a head of registered family under ‘Bhagat Puran Singh Sehat Beema Yojana’, the affected family would get compensation of Rs 5 lakh.
For the farmers, the Cabinet decided to implement a health and personal accident insurance scheme for those who bring their produce to the Purchase Centres established by the Punjab Mandi Board.
The farmers would be provided a health insurance cover of Rs 50,000 and an insurance of Rs 5 lakh in case of accidental death or incapacitation of head of family, the release said.
Nearly 11 lakh farmers stand to be benefited under this scheme. The premium for providing this health and personal accident scheme to the farmers would be paid by the government. A committee of Education Minister and Health Minister would coordinate and monitor these schemes, it said. i PTI
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