Punjab police re-opens a 2011 Mansa case against Baba Baljit Singh Daduwal

Faridkot, Punjab: Punjab police seems be have turns all guns towards recently arrested Sikh preacher Baljit Singh Daduwal. Cases against him that were laying buried under below the dust have started to pop up after this arrest. As per certain media reports, Punjab Police has re-opened yet another case against Baba Baljit Singh Daduwal, chief of Panthic Sewa Lehar and member of the newly formed Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (HSGMC – ad hoc). He was arrested on Friday by Faridkot police in a 5 years old case. Police had also booked him under Arms Act in a freshly registered case. He has been on police remand for last two days. According to media reports, a police team from Mansa district police yesterday (on August 23) reached Faridkot to procure Baljit Singh Daduwal’s transit remand in an attempt to murder case registered against him and his 11 supporters at Bhikhi on January 2, 2011.

The case was registered following an alleged clash between Baba Daduwal’s supporters and the police during his religious discourse. The police had reportedly apprehended a clash between Sikhs and Dera Sirsa followers after Daduwal allegedly made some remarks against controversial dera chief. “Three days after the registration of an FIR, the Mansa police had released Baba Daduwal and his supporters and dropped the charges against them, calling it a pro-active measure and goodwill gesture to ensure peace”, a news on Punjab Timeline has noted. However, the police has reprotedly re-opened the case. But as the court of the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Faridkot, extended Daduwal’s remand for another day in the five-year-old case in which he was arrested on August 21, the Mansa police did not proceed further with their transit remand application.

On March 16, 2009, the Bajakhana police in Faridkot had arrested Daduwal along with eight of his supporters for possessing nine fire weapons and 287 live cartridges. The case — Daduwal and his supporters were booked for attempt to murder after an alleged clash with the police — was re-opened on Friday. In this case too, the police had released Daduwal on March 25, 2009, saying “his custody was not required for the time being”. The police today produced seven more Daduwal’s supporters in the court, which remanded them in judicial custody. A large number of his supporters from Faridkot, Mansa and Bathinda and several HSGMC members from Haryana had gathered at the court complex in Faridkot today when Daduwal and his seven supporters were produced before the judicial magistrate. A heavy police force was deployed at the complex as the supporters raised slogans against the state government and the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) for allegedly harassing Daduwal for him being the frontline HSGMC leader.

Source: PunjabiSikhSangat.Org