Hand grenade attack at temple: Cops arrest second suspect
The Amritsar city police commissionerate has arrested the second suspect involved in the hand grenade attack on Thakur Dwara temple located on the Sher Shah Suri road in Khandwala area here five days ago.
Vishal alias Chui, a resident of Rajasansi area, had fled the scene when his accomplice Gursidak, alias Siddique, of Bal village was killed in an exchange of fire with the Chheharta police on March 18. Police Commissioner Gurpreet Singh Bhullar has confirmed his arrest.
On the intervening night of March 14 and 15, two motorcycle-borne persons had hurled a hand grenade on the first floor of Thakur Dwara temple, damaging the outer wall apart and creating panic in the area. The people had termed the incident as an attempt to create a divide among different communities for disturbing apeaceful atmosphere in Punjab.
Later, the CCTV footage of the incident showed two persons lobbing the explosives.
This was first such incident in which miscreants had targeted a religious place. It was the 13th hand grenade blast in Punjab in the past four months. Earlier, major police establishments were targeted by workers of foreign-based gangsters-turned-terrorists supported by Pakistan-based Inter Service Intelligence (ISI).
Police officials had claimed the hand of foreign-based gangsters-turned-terrorists supported by Pakistan-based agencies behind the incident. They said the police had already solved all the previous cases of blasts in Amritsar.
Two days ago, the police got a tip-off about the movements of the suspects on the Airport road following which the Chheharta police and CIA staff teams rushed to the spot and intercepted the duo.
The suspects abandoned the motorcycle and fled towards a field, where they opened fire on a police team. A bullet grazed the turban of Inspector Amolak Singh, another hit the left arm of head constable Gurpreet Singh and the third one hit a police vehicle.
Inspector Vinod Sharma opened fire in self-defence, injuring Gursiddak, while Vishal fled the scene.
