Punjab DGP Gaurav Yadav meets border range officers as gangster violence ‘escalates’
The meeting was attended by police chiefs of the districts and Additional Director General of Police-rank officers
Punjab Director General of Police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav on Friday held a meeting with senior officers of border range over “rising” cases of extortion and gangster violence.
The range comprises police districts of Batala, Gurdaspur, Tarn Taran, Amritsar (Rural) and Pathankot.
The meeting was attended by police chiefs of the districts and Additional Director General of Police-rank officers.
“The ever-increasing cases of extortion and gangster violence in Batala were discussed threadbare,” said an officer.
Police sources said the meeting was aimed at restoring the confidence of people in the force. It came two days after a medical store owner was gunned down in broad daylight in Dera Baba Nanak of the Batala police district after he allegedly received extortion calls. The border range is a critical administrative unit, which has its headquarters in Amritsar and is led by Sandeep Goel, a DIG-rank officer.
In Batala, the rivalry between gangsters Jaggu Bhagwanpuria and foreign-based Balwinder Singh Donny Bal has created terror. A majority of extortion cases have their origin in these two gangs.
Yadav said so far, the police have conducted 12,275 raids under its statewide drive against gangsters, arresting 3,721 people. “Apart from this, 1,796 unscrupulous elements have been taken into preventive custody.” he added.
Goldy Brar’s parents sent to 14-day judicial custody
Muktsar: A court here on Friday sent parents of designated terrorist Satinderjit Singh, alias Goldy Brar, to judicial custody for 14 days.
Goldy’s father Shamsher Singh and mother Pritpal Kaur were arrested from Amritsar on Monday in connection with an extortion case registered on the complaint of a government schoolteacher in 2024.
The schoolteacher had alleged that that Rs 50 lakh was demanded from him through a WhatsApp call from a foreign number.
They were produced in a court in Muktsar on the same day, which at that time sent them to one-day police custody. Later, the court had sent them to three-day police custody.
The police are probing their sources of income. Their arrests came amid an intensified crackdown by the state police against gangsters and their networks under the ongoing campaign “Gangsteran Te Vaar”.
Babu Singh Sidhu, the counsel for Goldy’s parents, said, “The police did not seek their remand today, and the court sent them to judicial custody for 14 days.”
Two days after the arrest of his parents, an audio clip purportedly of Goldy Brar had surfaced on social media, issuing a warning to the state government and the police.
Goldy’s parents are residents of Adesh Nagar on Kotkapura Road here. Shamsher Singh, a former ASI in the police, was given compulsory retirement in 2021 after his alleged involvement in a murder case in Muktsar. — TNS
