Chandigarh: An Amritsar court on Sunday extended till December 11 the police remand of Narain Singh Chaura, a former militant, who made an assassination bid on senior Akali leader Sukhbir Badal when the the latter was performing ‘guard duty’ as a part of his ‘religious punishment’ at the entrance of Golden Temple, on Wednesday.
Even though the police sought a 10-day remand, the court granted a remand of three days.
It may be recalled that Sukhbir, 62, had on Wednesday morning narrowly escaped an assassination bid when an ex-Khalistani militant Chaura attempted to fire at him from about six feet distance outside the Golden Temple in Amritsar where Sukhbir was serving his religious punishment as a ‘sevadar’ (guard) sitting in a wheelchair, besides his former Cabinet colleague Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa.
While the former deputy chief minister Sukhbir, escaped unhurt as the bullet hit a wall, Chaura, was instantly nabbed by the police from the spot. Chaura, it was learnt, was also named as the mastermind of the sensational 2004 Burail jail break in Chandigarh and remained wanted in several other terror-related cases. Jagtar Singh Hawara, the assassin of chief minister Beant Singh, had escaped from the Burail jail along with four other undertrials, by digging a tunnel in this shocking jail-break.
Even though details from the Punjab police were still awaited, Akali leader Daljit Singh Cheema, had called it a major security lapse and claimed that Chaura was roaming around Golden Temple for the past two days yet the police did not act in the context.
It was the second day of Sukhbir’s penance for his and other Akali leaders’ religious mistakes directed by Akal Takht on Monday. The Akali leaders were pronounced ‘tankhaiya’ (guilty of religious misconduct) by the Akal Takht about three months ago for the ‘mistakes’ committed by SAD government from 2007 to 2017 and its failure to address key issues of the Sikh community, when the SAD patriarch Parkash Singh Badal was chief minister and Sukhbir deputy chief minister and also the president of the party.
The ‘mistakes’ committed by the Akali leaders mentioned above, included – revocation of the blasphemy case against Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda head Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh for imitating Guru Gobind Singh in 2007, the failure to punish perpetrators of the Bargari sacrilege and police officials for the Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan firing incidents, besides others.
