Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal on Monday alleged that Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi is pressurizing the state police chief to implicate the Akali Dal leadership in the 2015 sacrilege and police firing cases.
According to a report, Badal while addressing a press conference in Phagwara in Kapurthala district accused CM Channi and Deputy CM Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa of interfering with the HC-ordered probe into the Kotkapura firing case.
Both leaders are holding meetings with the SIT (special investigation team) on a daily basis with the sole purpose of influencing the probe against the Akali Dal leadership, Badal said to reporters.
"Officers of the SIT are being directed to implicate the SAD leadership in the case. They are being told to get false statements recorded against the SAD leadership under Section 164 of the CrPC. I have specific information that DGP IPS Sahota has been told to identify persons who can implicate SAD leaders in the case," Sukhbir Singh Badal said.
Alleging that CM Channi was walking on the same line as his predecessor, Captain Amarinder Singh, Badal said, "It seems delivering justice to the Sikhs is not the priority of the Congress government. The Congress party continues to play politics on the sensitive issue of sacrilege. It is due to this that the culprits are still at large and have not been convicted till now."
Badal went further to say, "It is a matter of sorrow for us that we could not deliver justice on this issue. I apologized to the Sikhs earlier. I apologize even now. But this happened because the Congress party had put pressure on us to hand over the probe into the sacrilege case to the CBI. However, after a change in government, the state moved the court to take back the matter from the CBI, resulting in an inordinate wait for justice in the case."
