Punjab Election 2022: SAD trains guns at Congress over FIR against Bikram Majithia
Highlights
- SAD leader Bikram Majithia was booked under the NDPS Act
- Case against Majithia was registered on the basis of a 2018 status report of probe into a drug case
- SAD described the registration of case against Bikram Majithia as 'fabricated'
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) hit out at the Congress government in Punjab on Wednesday over the registration of a case against its leader Bikram Singh Majithia, terming it "fabricated".
Majithia (46) was booked under the relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act on Monday on the basis of a 2018 status report on a probe into a drug racket operating in the state.
The report was filed in the Punjab and Haryana High Court in 2018 by the anti-drug Special Task Force (STF) chief, Harpreet Singh Sidhu.
Majithia is the brother-in-law of SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal and the brother of former Union minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal. He had earlier denied all the charges against him.
SAD spokesperson Parambans Singh Romana claimed that Sidhu had admitted that he was related to Majithia and was not on talking terms with the latter's family for 15 years.
"Despite this, the fabricated FIR against Majithia relied on the report of Sidhu, which the latter himself admitted was an opinion and not a probe report. The officer has admitted that his report was based on the record of the Enforcement Directorate (ED). If that is so, the ED was competent to file a challan against Majithia if it had found anything incriminating against him. But it did not do so," Romana said in a statement.
He also said the trial in the case that Sidhu was referring to -- the Jagdish Bhola case -- had ended in January, 2019. "Bhola and one Jagjit Chahal were convicted and the third accused, Bittu Aulakh, was acquitted," the SAD leader said.
He said despite this factual position, Sidhu's report stated that Aulakh was instrumental in making the accused meet Majithia. Romana also pointed out that the high court had appointed a committee to go through the STF report. He said the report of the committee comprising the then additional chief secretary (home) and the director general of police was lying in a sealed cover in the high court, adding, "It should also be made public.
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