Chandigarh, Feb 24 (PTI) Punjab Cabinet minister Aman Arora on Monday warned government officials that the state government will take strict action if anyone is found misleading people who come to avail public services.

Arora's warning came during the Question Hour in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha after AAP MLA from Faridkot Gurdit Singh Sekhon asked whether the annual income limit to obtain an income certificate was Rs 80,000.

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The two-day Punjab Assembly session began on Monday.

In a response to the query, Arora informed the House that there was no minimum income limit to apply and obtain an income certificate.

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"It is applied based on the self-declaration of a citizen or applicant and approved and issued by the competent authority after verification.

"Citizens can apply for income certificate either through the Sewa Kendra, doorstep delivery service or the Connect portal. Since November 2023, a total of 1,95,815 certificates have been issued with income of less than Rs 80,000," Arora said.

The minister added that he came to know from AAP MLA Gurdit Singh that a person named Paramjit Gholu could not generate income certificates for his two "mentally ill" brothers after a tehsildar told him that the certificates cannot be issued if one has income of less than Rs 80,000.

The minister said that later the certificate was applied for and it will be issued soon.

"I want to send a message to those employees and officials who mislead people while sitting in government chairs. I want to tell them that if anyone misleads a person or does not help him, such an employee better get rid of his bad habits else the government will not take much time to turn him from a salaried employee to a pensioner," said Arora, who holds the governance reforms portfolio.

The minister also showed income certificates of people who have less than Rs 80,000 of annual income.

Intervening in the matter, Congress MLA Rana Gurjeet Singh sought strict action against those employees who harass the common man.

In response to another question, Arora said his renewable energy department has chalked out a plan to instal solar panels in 53,700 government buildings, including schools, for the supply of solar power.

He informed that solar panels of 5 KW have been installed in 4,238 government schools while similar work is underway in 2,400 more schools.

A sum of Rs 120 crore has already been spent on the project, he added.

"We have 19,110 schools and we have set a target that in the next two years, all these schools will be solar powered," he said.

AAP MLA from Sanour, Harmit Singh Pathanmajra, asked if electricity bills of government schools will be waived.

To which, Power Minister Harbhajan Singh replied that there was no provision for waiving electricity bills.

Replying to a question raised by Congress MLA Partap Singh Bajwa, who sought details of the oxygen generation plant at Dhariwal in Gurdaspur, Health Minister Balbir Singh said it was installed at the community health centre during the Covid-19 pandemic but it never became operational.

"Rs 1.10 crore was spent on it but due to its incompleteness, the cylinders were never filled. The tender for a servo stabiliser has been floated and it will be opened on February 25. The plant engineers will then make it operational in 15 days," Singh said.

Bajwa lamented that the oxygen plant for which he provided funds worth Rs 1.18 crore when he was a Rajya Sabha member has not been made operational yet.

The health minister replied that there were 41 such plants in the state which have not been made operational yet.

"I can make them operational. But being a doctor, I can say that it will not be right as the purity of oxygen generated by such plants is 94 per cent, whereas the purity of liquid oxygen is 99-100 per cent. In the interest of the patients, liquid oxygen be given. It is not wise to start such plants," he said.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)