Family to meet DGP, accuses minister of shielding culprits

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 21

The family members of former Akali sarpanch Dalbir Singh Dhilwan, who was brutally murdered at Dhilwan village in Batala on November 18, have sought the intervention of Punjab DGP for action against Cabinet Minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa for allegedly shielding the accused.

Senior Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia had yesterday sought the dismissal of the minister by linking him with the murder as well as with gangster Jaggu Bhagwanpuria against whom the Tarn Taran police has recently issued a dossier that he was spreading his network from inside the jail. He claimed that Bhagwanpuria had called the minister from jail to congratulate him on his taking charge of the Jails Department.

Sandeep Singh, deceased’s son, in a representation to the DGP said the Batala police had not even recorded their statement in the case and were trying to protect the culprits.

Majithia said even though the accused were yet to be arrested, the SSP Opinderjit Singh Ghuman was giving statements that it was a spur of the moment murder out of personal enmity.

Furnishing documents, he countered the claim of Batala police and said, “The police claimed that the accused and victim had a dispute over boundaries of their agricultural land. The revenue records show that they don’t share any boundary. Instead, nearly two acres of land between them belongs to some other person.”

Majithia said Randhawa had a tiff with the family in 2004 during the 2004 parliamentary elections. In the ensuing scuffle with family members of Dalbir Dhilwan, the then chief parliamentary secretary’s turban was toppled. “Randhawa held Dalbir and his father Sant Singh responsible for the act and threatened Sant that he had lost two sons (they were alleged terrorists shot by the police in an encounter) and would lose the remaining one also,” he alleged.