But the Congress, which has termed Majithia as the "greatest goon", was quick to take advantage of Badal's barbs. "We had told him (Badal) to rein in Majithia but he did not listen earlier," Punjab Congress president Amarinder Singh said.
The Congress leader even questioned Badal's credentials on spending 17 years in jails. "Let him tell us which jails he spent this much of time. He spent his time in the state rest houses, amidst all the comforts that anyone could get. He had a standard way of provoking people to violence, getting himself lodged in the government guest houses and coming out to win elections."
Some in the Punjab government and the Akali Dal are questioning what the Sukhbir-Majithia duo is going to deliver after the "successful" conference.
"They had organized an NRI conference in the first year of the previous term (2007-12) also. After that, nothing was done. This time they have repeated the same things," a senior Akali Dal leader said.
The conference, like the one in January 2008, saw Sukhbir Badal making a power-point presentation promising the moon to NRIs to seek investments for Punjab.
He talked of big things, including Punjab becoming power surplus by next year and even supplying electricity to Pakistan. But for the common man, be it in Ludhiana, Bathinda, Moga or Hoshiarpur, there seemed to be no respite from power cuts - ranging from six hours to 10 hrs a day.
