Balwant Singh Rajoana begins fast inside Patiala jail

Tribune News Service

Patiala, December 5

Panthic politics is on the boil in Punjab after Beant Singh’s assassin Balwant Singh Rajoana started a hunger strike inside the Central Jail, Patiala, after the SGPC executive turned down his request to withdraw the mercy plea filed on his behalf.

Last week Rajoana had threatened to proceed on a hunger strike on December 5 as he had asked the SGPC to withdraw his mercy petition against death sentence.

The SGPC had appealed to Rajoana to give up his decision of hunger strike while being in the Patiala jail as his mercy petition remained inconclusive for the past 11 years.

Sources say that Rajoana skipped his morning tea and breakfast and also refused to cook his evening meal inside his solitary barrack which is allowed for convicted inmates.

Rajoana’s adopted sister Kamaldeep Kaur today met him and also showed a letter written to the Akal Takht Jathedar on December 5. “Keeping someone in prison for 28 years, 17 years in solitary barrack, awaiting hanging and keeping his mercy plea pending for 12 years is the violation of human rights and thus I am proceeding on hunger strike”, Rajoana mentioned in the letter.

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