‘Political patronage shielding gangsters’: Navjot Kaur Sidhu

Sidhu also said that soon she will be writing to the Punjab DGP Suresh Arora, CM Parkash Singh Badal and central government to intervene in the case.

Targetting the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), Chief Parliamentary Secretary Navjot Kaur Sidhu Saturday claimed that ‘political patronage’ was shielding gangsters and criminals.

Sidhu, who was in Ludhiana to meet the family of Inderpal Singh Ahuja, who committed suicide alleging police atrocity and had left a suicide note on Facebook naming three cops, said, “This is not an isolated case. There are various such cases in which political patronage is helping in shielding the accused. This man committed suicide after there was no hope left for him. The main accused in the murder case, for which he was being interrogated- was associated to SAD. This shows the nexus that exists and continues to flourish between politicians and these criminals who are not punished as per law.”

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Sidhu while speaking to The Sunday Express said that government must intervene and register an FIR against the three policemen named by Ahuja on the social networking site.

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“It is his dying declaration. A self-declaration by a person before dying is enough to book those named by the victim. That is what the law says. His family does not want to pursue the case because they have financial constraints and they are terrified. This does not mean that government and police can let it go so that the accused can go scot-free. Justice with the family has to be done,” she said.

Demanding that the sister of the victim be given a government job immediately, she said, “Who will earn for this family now? He was the only earning member in the family. Now I will ensure that his sister gets a government job immediately.”

Sidhu also said that soon she will be writing to the Punjab DGP Suresh Arora, CM Parkash Singh Badal and central government to intervene in the case.

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“A man has died after naming the three policemen. His statement stands legal- does not matter it is on social media or wherever. FIR has to be registered and I will be taking it up till the end,” she assured. Alleging police torture and extortion at hands of three policemen from Dugri police station, Ahuja jumped before a train Friday.

He was being interrogated by police in a auto driver’s murder case who was shot dead by gangster Gourav Sharma alias Goru Bachha. Bachha allegedly got his mobile phone recharged from Ahuja’s shop multiple times.

Divya Goyal

Divya Goyal is a Principal Correspondent with The Indian Express, based in Punjab. Her interest lies in exploring both news and feature stories, with an effort to reflect human interest at the heart of each piece. She writes on gender issues, education, politics, Sikh diaspora, heritage, the Partition among other subjects. She has also extensively covered issues of minority communities in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She also explores the legacy of India's partition and distinct stories from both West and East Punjab. She is a gold medalist from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC), Delhi, the most revered government institute for media studies in India, from where she pursued English Journalism (Print). Her research work on “Role of micro-blogging platform Twitter in content generation in newspapers” had won accolades at IIMC. She had started her career in print journalism with Hindustan Times before switching to The Indian Express in 2012. Her investigative report in 2019 on gender disparity while treating women drug addicts in Punjab won her the Laadli Media Award for Gender Sensitivity in 2020. She won another Laadli for her ground report on the struggle of two girls who ride a boat to reach their school in the border village of Punjab. ... Read More

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