Sikhs For Justice to Challenges Dismissal of Parkash Badal

New York, USA: Rights group challenged the dismissal of human rights violation case against CM Badal and filed appeal with the US Circuit Court. The Sikh group has challenged the May 17 order of Federal Judge dismissing the case against CM Badal for failure to effectuate service and the order denying rights group’s motion to conduct jurisdictional discovery. Judge Adelman had dismissed the case holding that that CM Badal was never served with the court summons as claimed by the rights group ‘Sikh for Justice’ (SJF) and SAD (Amritsar).

The appeal to the Circuit Court is based on Judge Adelman’s refusal to grant additional time to SFJ for discovery of evidence showing nexus between Badal and Kalra who claimed to have received summons instead of Badal and not allowing to depose Badal who is the main witness on the issue of service.

Urging the US Court of Appeals to hear the Sikh human rights violations case against CM Badal, the rights group will present the contemporary evidence showing witness tampering; obstruction of justice and harassment of US based victims of human rights violation by Badal administration. SFJ and SAD (Amirtsar) are represented by Ian Levin of “Pavich Law Group” a former US Federal Judge with experience in rights violation cases under Alien Tort Claims Act and Torture Victim Protection Act.

The appeal to the US Circuit Court argues that Judge Adelman should have strike down Kalra’s testimony, the interpreter who claimed to have been served instead of Badal and disqualified him as witness, because Kalra admitted during his deposition that he “remained in closed door meeting with Punjab Government Officials at Hotel Pfister in Milwaukee immediately prior to testifying in the court.” Kalra could not explain to the Court purpose of his three hour long meeting with Badal government agents Ananya Gautam DIG Counter Intelligence, Sanjeev K Rampal SSP and head of CM Badal’s security chief and Advocate General Sidhu.

According to attorney Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, legal advisor to SFJ, the appeal to US Circuit court raises several crucial questions, like, why there was no video of Badal at the Boelter store; why armed State Department agents confronted Kratochvil, the process server at his home and would not produce — even for Judge Adelman’s eyes — a statement they say process server signed and why Badal’s attorneys never produced even an affidavit denying that he was not at Oak Creek High School and was not served.

Terming the appeal to be vital to the cause of Sikh human rights, attorney Pannun, stated that evidence showing the threat and filing of false cases against SAD (Amirtsar) activists by Badal administration will also be presented to the US Court of Appeals.

The rights group SFJ, victims Jeet Singh Auloarkh, Gurdeep Kaur, Jagtar Singh and SAD (Amritsar) a political party headed by Simranjit Singh Mann filed a human rights violations case against CM Badal on charges of commanding and shielding the police force which is responsible for extra judicial killings and continuous human rights violations against the Sikh community in Punjab.

Source: Sikhsforjustice.org