FEROZEPUR: When a score of MLAs of Shiromani Akali Dal were ready to vacate their assembly seats for Sukhbir Badal in 2009, he decided to contest from Jalalabad assembly segment, represented by Sher Singh Ghubaya at that time. Ghubaya gave up the seat and was rewarded with SAD ticket for Ferozepur parliamentary constituency.His closeness to Badal family then is in total contrast with the situation after a decade. While he has not spoken much against former CM Parkash Singh Badal, Ghubaya has made his dislike for party president Sukhbir quite apparent.When a sleazy video clip of Ghubaya appeared in the social media, he blamed Sukhbir for it. Even before that he had already targeted his own party’s government when the state vigilance bureau had conducted raid at the engineering college operated by Ghubaya family. Sukhbir was of course holding the home ministery portfolio and the message seemed clear to all. The things came to a head with 56-year-old Ghubaya addressing a press conference with Congress MP Ravneet Singh Bittu when he contested against Sukhbir from Jalalabad assembly segment in the 2017 state assembly elections. He had already got his son Davinder a Congress ticket from Fazilka assembly segment. For his supporters, Davinder’s victory proved that Ghubaya Senior could survive politically even outside the Akali Dal.In July 2018, Ghubaya raised the matter in Parliament of readjustment and even adding new constituencies in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies in keeping with the increased population of scheduled castes (SCs) and scheduled tribes (STs) in the country. He reasoned that given the increase in SC population in Punjab, the number of reserved assembly seats should be hiked from 34 to 36. The SC population, which was 28.9% in the 2001 census, had increased to 31.9% as per 2011.On the other hand, the unabated smuggling of drugs, distillation of illicit liquor and contamination of water giving rise to cancer and deformities among children are some of the issues, local political leaders have to face and don’t seem to be able to find any permanent solution.Ghubaya, who is matriculation pass, had promised to the border area people to strongly take up the matter of opening of Hussainiwala border with Pakistan for trade.He distributed over 200 iron water tankers, costing Rs 1.35 lakh each, in many villages of Ferozepur. He also spent his MPLAD fund for installation of reverse osmosis (RO) systems in 150 schools and other important points in villages, with each costing nearly Rs 2 lakh. He managed to spend Rs 21.71 crore of the Rs. 22.5 crore sanctioned under MPLAD funds.

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