Sukhbir Badal to sue 2015 police firing case probe chief

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Chandigarh, April 19 (IANS) Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Singh Badal on Monday said he had never met Ajit Singh, a witness in the 2015 Kotkapura police firing case, and that he would file a defamation suit against Inspector General (IG) Kunwar Vijay Partap Singh for falsely claiming that he had tried to lure the witness.

In a statement here, the SAD President said it was clear that IG Kunwar Vijay Pratap, who was heading state's Special Investigating Team (SIT) to probe into the firing incident, was obsessed with targeting SAD and the Badal family.

It was with this purpose that he had forwarded a malicious letter to the Director General of Police and made these wild allegations."The IG knew from the proceedings of the Kotkapura firing case in the high court that his probe would be cast aside. The latest allegation is a result of this deep rooted frustration and aimed at politicising a case after wasting three years pursuing the political agenda of the Congress party.

"The IG tried to implicate SAD and its senior leadership in the case at the instance of the Congress government but he was unsuccessful in this task. It is a clear case of gross misuse of his official position by the IG to please his political bosses rather than nailing the culprits in the case."

Badal said Ajit Singh had also set the record straight by asserting that he had not been approached by anyone for a job in the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) and that he had approached the Sikh institution for a job.

"The witness has also submitted that even this request is pending and that he has not been offered any job by the SGPC."

He said despite such a clear cut rebuttal from the witness, the IG had prevailed upon a section of the media to publish this malafide report.

Badal said SAD had always stood for speedy investigation into all cases related to the heinous incidents of sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib.

"It is unfortunate that after failing to nail those responsible for the reprehensible acts, the Congress government is politicizing the issue by using Kunwar Vijay Pratap to strike out at me," Badal added.

Two persons were killed and many others were injured after the police under the previous SAD-BJP government resorted to unprovoked firing on hundreds of people protesting the alleged desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib in Bargari village in Faridkot district in 2015.

Earlier this month, the Punjab and Haryana High Court had quashed state's probe into the Kotkapur firing case and directed the state to constitute a new SIT without Vijay Pratap Singh.

The directions were passed by the bench of Justice Rajbir Sherawat, which was hearing a plea filed by Gurdeep Singh, former police officer at Kotkapura, and another official who had approached the court seeking directions to remove the IPS officer from the investigation team.

After the high court order, the Chief Minister had refused to accept the resignation letter of Vijay Pratap Singh seeking premature retirement from service.

--IANS

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