APS Deol’s resignation accepted, in Channi-Sidhu Truce Deol out

Chandigarh : Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi on Tuesday accepted the resignation of APS Deol. This acceptance comes amid move that meets sulking Congress leader Navjot Sidhu’s demand and signals a truce between the ruling party’s top two leaders in the state.

“The Punjab cabinet has accepted the resignation of Advocate-General APS Deol,” Mr Channi told reporters this evening, with Mr Sidhu sitting by his side.

This acceptance comes day after the Chief Minister appeared to back his government’s top lawyer, and underlined his confidence in their ability to get results.

The former cricketer – whose bitter public feud with Amarinder Singh pushed the veteran politician into quitting as Chief Minister and then leaving the Congress – had demanded APS Deol be fired for representing two accused cops in the 2015 sacrilege and police firing case.

Last week Mr Sidhu indicated he would take back his resignation as the Congress’ Punjab chief – but only if the state government removed APS Deol from office.

Mr Deol had been made the Punjab government’s top lawyer by Chief Minister Channi after his predecessor, Atul Nanda, quit following Amarinder Singh’s resignation.

His appointment, as well as that of Iqbal Singh Sahota as Punjab’s top cop, were decided by Mr Channi and his new government, but were widely seen as having infuriated Mr Sidhu, who had demanded to be consulted in appointments to top posts.

Sources had earlier told NDTV that Mr Channi had initially refused Mr Deol’s offer of resignation – a move seen as a signal to Mr Sidhu that it was the Chief Minister, and not the MLA, who was in charge of the government.

Last week Mr Deol slammed Mr Sidhu for “repeated utterances (that) seek to derail the earnest efforts of the state to ensure justice in the ‘drugs matter’ and the ‘sacrilege cases’”.

He also accused Mr Sidhu – whose attacks on his own government augur ill ahead of next year’s Assembly election – of “spreading misinformation to gain a political advantage over his political colleagues”.

“There is a concerted attempt by vested interests to malign the functioning of the Congress party in view of the coming elections in Punjab for their selfish political gain, by politicizing the constitutional office of the Advocate General of Punjab,” Mr Deol wrote in a brief statement issued Saturday morning.