Victimized for daring to educate daughter in good school says Singhi Ram

By: Ravinder Makhaik

Shimla: Without revealing much, former minister Singhi Ram alluded to being victimized and harassed because he was a Dalit who had dared to educate his daughters in a good school, where children of other senior congress leaders were also studying.

Talking to the media Ram here today referred to his background as a congressman saying that he had joined the party in 1977 and from 1982 for 25 years till 2007 had an unbroken stint of 6 terms as legislator from the Rampur reserved constituency.

“Never has a sitting cabinet minister been denied a ticket, yet I was denied one in the 2007 election at the behest of some senior state party leaders,” said Ram who was the horticulture minister in Virbhadra’s cabinet from 2003 to 2007.

He said that despite being a congressman for such a long time efforts were being made to expel him from the party.

“Holding of Ambedkar Diwas at Rampur recently where I was invited as chief guest is being dubbed as anti-party activity by a section of the party who are opposed to me in the assembly segment and they have even sought my expulsion from the party” he said.

He added that party president Sonia Gandhi and youth leader Rahul Gandhi would be apprised in writing about the treatment being meted out to him.

Having remained a Virbhadra loyalist for over two decades, the congressman claimed that there were no differences with the former chief minister.

“My only fault of falling out of favour appears to be that I as a dalit had aspired to educate my daughters where only royal families used to send their children,” he said.

Dismissing allegations of any misuse of office when he was the cabinet minister, Ram said, “if there was any misuse, the chief minister then should have dismissed me from the cabinet.”

Terming it a ‘conspiracy’ to damage him politically, he said that he and his daughter had been falsely implicated in a forged certificate case.

Refraining to say more he said that the matter was in court and would await the verdict before disclosing more facts.

He said that his three daughters, his wife and he himself were living in fear and were a depressed lot for the past two and half years.