Congress’s Balbir Sidhu slams AAP over Rs 912 crore Mohali roads project

Sidhu underlined the staggering cost of the project, which effectively bills the taxpayer nearly Rs 11 crore per kilometre for urban road repair and “beautification.”

“This is not development; it is a daylight robbery of Punjab’s exchequer,” Sidhu said. “The AAP government is establishing a dangerous pattern of bypassing capable local contractors to favour external entities. By awarding this tender to an outside firm at such inflated rates, the government is intentionally diverting Punjab’s resources away from its own people and industry.”

He also questioned the government’s rush to issue the Letter of Award (LoA) while the project remains mired in legal challenges before the Punjab and Haryana High Court. He argued that the combination of repeated budget revisions, unusually high costs, and the selection of a controversial contractor creates a “stench of corruption and kickbacks.”

While reiterating that Mohali deserves world-class infrastructure, Sidhu insisted that development cannot come at the cost of transparency. “The people of Punjab deserve to know why their money is being handed over to a firm already in the dock for poor quality elsewhere. We demand a full justification of these costs and a transparent review of the selection process,” he added.

Sidhu also warned that the Congress party would not remain a silent spectator to the “systematic looting” of the state’s resources and would continue to seek accountability for every rupee of public money.