London: UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer has dropped the plans to give a peerage to a leading Sikh independence supporter amid concerns over his alleged extremist links, as reported by Daily Mail on Sunday.
The leader belonging to the Labour Party is facing calls to explain his decision after friends of public official Dabinderjit Singh Sidhu said that it was 'complete nonsense' to say he was a fanatic.
"Mr Singh, a long-standing campaigner for the creation of a sovereign Sikh state in Punjab in India, was due to be one of six new Labour peers announced just before Christmas. But The Mail on Sunday understands that on the day of the announcement, he was told Sir Keir had withdrawn his nomination," Daily Mail reported.
The UK opposition party sources on Saturday said that they had received the new information pertaining to Singh's background. It was reported that Singh in 2008 that he was a member of the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF) which was banned in the UK in 2001 amid Home Office warnings its members were a threat to national security.
One Labour MP who knows Singh on Saturday called on Keir to 'sort this out', suggesting inexperience in his office had led to the confusion. Singh's friends denied he had been a member of the Sikh youth organisation and added that he had always campaigned peacefully for a Khalistan independent Sikh state.
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