Intimidation case: Sukhpal Khaira walks out on bail, says being targeted like Pak ex-PM Imran Khan

Khaira, meanwhile, said he had to “pay the price for speaking the truth”. Speaking to the media after coming out of the Nabha jail, Khaira said: “I spent so many days in jail despite being innocent. I have been named in these fake FIRs because I raised the real issues of Punjab”.

The Bholath MLA also compared himself with the jailed former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan. “He is a very nice man. Just like I was booked in false cases for speaking the truth, he too is facing the same in Pakistan,” the Congress leader said.

“The Aam Aadmi Party government wanted to torture me mentally. They installed a camera inside my jail barrack where I was in a solitary confinement. It is unprecedented and a direct attack on my life, liberty, and independence…I have come out stronger mentally. No one can stop me from speaking about the truth or for rights of Punjab,” Khaira said, while adding that “all leaders including those from BJP, SAD and Congress have supported me” .

Khaira was arrested on January 4 after he was granted bail by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in connection with a 2015 NDPS case. Khaira was arrested after the Kapurthala Police registered a fresh case against him under sections 195A (threatening any person to give false evidence) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code on the complaint of Ranjit Kaur, the wife of Kashmir Singh, a key witness in the 2015 drug case.

Earlier, Khaira was arrested in September in connection with the 2015 case, triggering accusations of political vendetta against the state’s ruling AAP from the Congress.

The drugs case was registered in March 2015 at Jalalabad in Fazilka and nine people, including Gurdev Singh, allegedly a close aide of Khaira, were booked and later convicted. The police had seized two kg of heroin, 24 gold biscuits, a country-made pistol, a .315-bore pistol and two Pakistani SIM cards from them.

In her complaint, Kaur had alleged that two unidentified masked persons came to her home on a motorcycle on October 15 last year and threatened to kill her family if Singh did not withdraw his statement against Khaira. She further alleged that on October 22 last year, she received an anonymous call and was threatened that her family would be eliminated.

In the 2015 case, Khaira — summoned as an additional accused — had last year claimed that he was summoned despite the Supreme Court staying the trial court proceedings against him in 2017.

He was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in 2021 on charges of money laundering linked to the 2015 case and was granted bail in 2022. Last February, the apex court quashed the summons against Khaira in the 2015 case.

Meanwhile, Leader of Opposition in Punjab Vidhan Sabha, Partap Singh Bajwa said justice has prevailed. “It is the defeat of repression done by the Bhagwant Mann government. This decision has restored faith of public in our judicial system,” Bajwa said on X.

Punjab Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring said, “The law stands strong for those who are true…The misuse of power by AAP will not go unquestioned”.