Order ‘cryptic’, Khadoor Sahib MP Amritpal moves high court to challenge parole denial

Days after Punjab rejected Amritpal Singh’s plea for temporary release from jail to attend the Winter session of Parliament from December 1 to 19, the Khadoor Sahib MP today moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court again, challenging his representation’s rejection. He has, among other things, referred to the case of Baramulla Awami Ittehad Party MP Engineer Rashid, who was earlier also permitted by a Delhi court to attend the session.

Taking up the plea, the division bench headed by Justice Ashwani Kumar Mishra fixed the matter for hearing on Monday. Appearing before the court, his counsel at the onset mentioned: “The Punjab Government was directed to decide the decide the application within a week. Day before yesterday (Wednesday), they have dismissed the application”. He added the bench might fix the matter on Monday.

The petition will now likely be taken up on December 1 by the bench headed by Chief Justice Sheel Nagu as the previous direction to the government to decide the plea was issued by it.

The bench on November 21 had disposed of the matter while asking “the Home Secretary, Department of Home Affairs and Justice, to decide the application dated November 13 already filed by the petitioner within a week from today, preferably before the commencement of the Winter session of Parliament”.

In his plea, Amritpal Singh added the detention order was politically motivated and passed with malafide intent of silencing the elected Member of Parliament representing 19 lakh constituents. His continuous detention undermined democratic rights and will of the electorate.

Referring to the order dated November 24 dismissing his application for temporary release/parole, he submitted that it was illegal, arbitrary way and cryptic as there was no reasonable basis for passing the same. Reliance was placed upon the comments of the Amritsar District Magistrate and Amritsar Rural SSP, stating that his temporary release for attending the session was a threat to the security of the state and maintenance of public order. This was “despite the fact that the visit of the petitioner to Parliament would be completely outside the jurisdictional limits of the state of Punjab”, his counsel added.

Detained at Dibrugarh Central Jail under the National Security Act, the Khadoor Sahib MP had earlier also invoked Section 15 of the NSA, which empowers the competent authority to grant parole to a detainee in exceptional circumstances.

Amritpal’s plea, filed through counsel Imaan Singh Khara, had stated that despite being in preventive detention since April 2023, the petitioner was elected from the Khadoor Sahib constituency in the 2024 General Election with nearly 4 lakh votes.