Capt: Badal knew about Op Bluestar

Varinder Singh

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, January 24

PPCC chief Capt Amarinder Singh alleged here today that Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal had known about the Centre’s plans regarding Operation Bluestar.

Amarinder was one of the emissaries between the then PM Indira Gandhi and Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale. Corroborating the CIA’s “disclosures”, he said, “Badal was constantly in touch with the Centre, particularly Indira Gandhi.”

He accused Badal of sabotaging the peace process initiated first by Indira and later by Rajiv Gandhi. “For the sake of attaining power, he kept provoking innocent youths in the name of the Sikh cause,” Amarinder said in an interview with The Tribune.

“Badal was even aware of the date when the 1984 operation was to be launched. It was he who had given a sort of green signal to the Centre. His subsequent arrest was stage-managed,” he said.

Rejecting the allegations, SAD spokesperson Manjinder Singh Sirsa said: “Badal has spent more than 16 years of his life in jails for the cause of Punjab. Has Amarinder done so? Rather, he belongs to the party which was responsible for Operation Bluestar. No authentic CIA documents exist and no one can prove the charges.”