Sukhpal Khaira produced in Jalalabad court, remanded in two-day police custody

Praful Chander Nagpal

Fazilka, September 28

The Punjab Police today got two-day remand of Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira, who was arrested from Chandigarh earlier in the day, on the allegations of drug smuggling (with the involvement of Pakistan smugglers), money laundering and fake passport racket.

The police sought the remand claiming it wanted to recover the SIM cards (Indian and Pakistani) from him through which cross-border smuggling was coordinated.

Khaira had allegedly spoken to one of the convicted smugglers 78 times. The police said they also wanted to get details about foreign visits of Khaira over the past few years. The police also pleaded that it needed details of Khaira’s accounts and property.

After his arrest in Chandigarh, the police brought Khaira to Jalalabad where he was kept at the Sadar police station. He was taken to the Jalalabad Civil Hospital for medical examination.

Later, he was produced in the court of Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMIC), Jalalabad, who remanded him in police custody for two days. The police had sought his seven-day custody.

Khaira’s counsel Sanjeev Kamboj said no evidence against Khaira was found by the SIT that presented its report on June 25, 2021.

Former Jalalabad Congress MLA Raminder Awla and former MP Sher Singh Ghubaya met Khaira in Jalalabad. The Congress workers raised slogans against the police and the Punjab Government outside the court complex.

At the Civil Hospital, Khaira told reporters that the police officials were behaving like mercenaries of the state. “I was falsely trapped on the basis of a call record first by the Badals, then by former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and now by ruling AAP in the same NDPS case of 2015,” he said, asking if any person could be implicated several times in the same case.

His counsel also presented a video clip of 2017 in which CM Bhagwant Mann (then an MP from Sangrur) had said that Khaira was trapped in a false drug case without any evidence.

The 2015 NDPS case

March 2015

• Jalalabad police arrest nine persons with 2 kg heroin, 24 gold biscuits, one country-made pistol, two Pakistani SIM cards and a Tata Safari vehicle
• IGP Paramraj Singh Umranangal tells media that one smuggler Gurdev Singh was a confidant of MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira
• Khaira, Congress MLA at that time, also alleges political vendetta at the hands of the then SAD-BJP government (2012-2017)

December 2015

Khaira joins AAP, wins election from Bholath

October 31, 2017

Court summons Khaira as an additional accused

November: Khaira moves the HC claiming political vendetta by Congress. Later, moves the Supreme Court also. He says Congress leadership was victimising him as he had left the party and joined AAP

June 2021

Khaira rejoins Congress

November: The ED arrests Khaira on charges of money laundering

April 2023

Punjab Govt forms a new SIT under DIG Swapan Sharma to investigate the case afresh

September: Punjab Police arrest Khaira on the basis of the findings of the new SIT

Trapped falsely

I was falsely trapped on the basis of call record first by the Badals, then by former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and now by ruling AAP in the same NDPS case of 2015. — Sukhpal Singh Khaira, Congress MLA