KYC of Preneet Kaur-from social worker to an entrepreneur to politician, a journey of ups and downs

Kanwar Inder Singh/ royalpatiala.in News/ April 22,2024

Preneet Kaur, a Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) candidate from Patiala has seen many ups and downs in her personal, political life.

Preneet Kaur, member parliament , former MLA and former Minister of State for External Affairs was born on 3rd October 1944 at Shimla. She Studied at Chelsea and finally graduated from St. Bedes College, Shimla with a BA degree and Teachers Course degree.

She is married to Capt. Amarinder Singh, Former Chief Minister of Punjab. They have one daughter Jayainder Kaur and one son Raninder Singh. Her sister Geetinder kaur is married to Shiromani Akali Dal (Mann) president Simranjit Singh Mann, who is also a MP from Sangrur.

Initially, she had started her social work career with the Red Cross Hospital Welfare Section in late 60s and continued working there till 1980. She also did other social work to ameliorate the lot of the down-trodden. She chaired Committees of Harijan Sewak Sangh and Citizens Welfare Council in Patiala for about a decade. She received the President’s Award in the 70’s for her work in the Red Cross Hospital Welfare Section.

Before entering into politics, in late nineties, she had even run, managed a Boutique ‘PreHaar Creations” . The said ladies boutique was opened by her in collaboration with her friend at a residence in Hira Nagar area of Patiala city.

Later she contested lok sabha election on Congress ticket in 1999 and represented Patiala in the lower house. Again in 2004, 2009 she was elected as lok sabha MP from Patiala . But she lost 2014 elections to Dr Dharamvira Gandhi. She was elected MLA from Patiala Vidhan Sabha constituency in August 2014, after losing 2014 parliamentary elections. In 2019, she again won the lok sabha elections for fourth time and represented Patiala in lower house.

Till date she had represented Patiala parliamentary constituency for 20 long years (4 terms of 5 years each).

She has widely travelled in India and abroad. She has been to the United Kingdom, U.S.A., Canada, South Africa, Mauritius, Poland, Italy, Turkey, Iran, Switzerland, Belgium, Pakistan, Germany, Holland, France, Kuwait, Austria, Singapore, Hong Kong and Mongolia on various diplomatic and public assignments.

She is an art-enthusiast and her hobbies also include reading. 

VISION AND MISSION AS MP

She said “she has a vision, mission to solve the annual fury of river Ghaggar . She had already made a project proposal of Rs 1400 crore to solve this issue. But due to some issues, the same was not done. If elected for the fifth time, she will surely solve the Ghaggar issue on priority.”

Another area of concern is the employment. She said “she will implement various ‘Youth Centric schemes’ launched by the centre government, in her parliamentary constituency. These schemes were not implemented due to state-centre clash.  The centre has initiated number of schemes for all categories of society and those will implement in my constituency, on priority basis. ”

CONTROVERSY

In 2015, it was alleged that Preneet kaur and her son Raninder Singh had Swiss bank accounts. Earlier when her name had come up in a leaked HSBC list, Preneet Kaur had denied having any account in her name with any foreign bank.

She had denied the charges and had said that her statement was recorded earlier by the tax authorities, but she was not shown any document which might indicate having a foreign bank account or a trust.

Her son Raninder Singh‘s involvement in an alleged foreign exchange violations case was being probed the enforcement agency. ED had initiated investigation against Raninder Singh under FEMA following a complaint by the I-T department about the Trusts owned by him in British Virgin Islands.

Her relations with her brother-in-law got strained after Malwinder Singh accuses her for  for “pressing upon” the candidature of her son Raninder Singh from Samana and for “filing” for the ticket on his behalf in 2022 state assembly poll.

Before joining BJP, her old party Congress had suspended her for anti party activities.

REPORT CARD AS FOUR TIME MP AND ONE TIME AS MLA,PATIALA

She ranked among top ten Members of Parliament in 14th & 15th Lok Sabha, insofar as the utilization of MPLAD funds was concerned.

During her tenure as MP, she remained Member of Standing Committee on Water Resources; on Consumer Affairs Food & Public Distribution (Oct 1999 to Feb 2004); Consultative Committee for Ministry of Agriculture (Oct 1999 to Feb 2004); Regional Direct Taxes Advisory Committee (Income Tax); Department of Personnel & Administrative Reforms Advisory Council Punjab; State Health Chairperson of Patiala Polo & Riding Club. Members of Institute Body, Selection Committee and the Governing Body of Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research Chandigarh (April 2006 to Dec 2008).

Committee on Empowerment of Women; Committee on Public Undertakings; Consultative Committee for Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas and the Advisory Committee on the Regional Direct Taxes. She became a Member of the Women’s Co-ordination Committee of the Asian Pacific Region for two years and attended conferences in Cape Town and also in Geneva.

She is the Chairperson of the Patiala Heritage Society and had been instrumental in starting Patiala Heritage Festival, aimed at revitalizing the glorious legacy of the Malwa in general, and Patiala, in particular.

She served as Minister of State for External Affairs, Govt. of India from May 2009 to May 2014. During her tenure as MoS she contributed a lot for the betterment of Indian Diaspora. Her initiatives included (i) regularization of 40 thousand Indians family members of Indian Diaspora, including 16 thousand Punjabis in Italy; (ii) release of 17 young men who were facing death penalty in Dubai (iii) presided over UN session for creation of UN WOMEN a new organization under United Nations for empowerment of women (iv) relief to wives abandoned by NRI husbands (v) safe return of more than 800 Indians/Punjabis from Bengazhi, Libya (vi) helped set up a mechanism in France and Italy to sensitize their law-enforcing personnel as to sanctity of turban for the Sikhs (vii) facilitated a number of Punjabi formers to settle in African countries (viii) allowed the facility of Indian Visa and passport to the derivatives of those who sought or obtained. asylum abroad. (ix) ex-gratia paid to families of those Punjabis who were killed in Australia (x) Transportation of deadbodies of Indians/Punjabis to India on Government Expense (xi) rescuing sailors from Somalian Pirates more than once.

She brought a number of major projects for her constituency, such as (i) Rajiv Gandhi National Law University  (ii) upgradation of Rajindra Hospital, Patiala as Multi Super- Speciality hospital (iii) setting up of Footwear Design and Development Institute (FDDI) at Banur (iv) bringing Patiala town within the ambit of National Capital Region, Delhi (NCR) as one of its 10 Counter Magnets (v) implementation of 1st phase of Ghaggar Project.

She has had to her credit the creation of a wide range of rural infrastructure, especially in the field of health, road network, drainage, water supply and sanitation in her entire parliamentary constituency.

She took up at appropriate levels in the Govt. of India various major issues including (a) exemption of agriculture lands abutting urban areas from wealth tax (b) demands of farming community (c) exemption of service charges on goldsmithries (d) withdrawal of cut in Arhtia’s Commission (e) FCI labourers’ problems (f) rice millers concerns (g) various railway projects, etc. etc.