SIT reaches Kotkapura to probe 7-year-old police firing incident

Tribune News Service

Faridkot, October 11

The special investigation team (SIT) probing the 2015 Kotkapura police firing incident reached Kotkapura today and visited the spots where the alleged firing during a protest against sacrilege incidents on October 14 that year had left many persons injured.

Moga SSP Gulneet Singh Khurana led the team here today. While SIT members refused to share any information about their visit, they reportedly spoke to the owners of some shops located near the spot.

The SIT visit assumes importance as it will be seven years on October 14 since the incident took place. Various Sikh organisations had given a call to intensify their protest against the state government on October 14 at Behbal Kalan for its “failure to deliver justice”.

“The SIT members visited Kotkapura in view of our October 14 programme. In the past seven years, these SITs have delivered nothing,” alleged Sukhraj Singh, who has been sitting on a dharna for nearly seven months at Behbal Kalan, demanding justice in the police firing and sacrilege incidents. His father Bhagwan Krishan Singh was one of two persons killed in the police firing at Behbal Kalan.

Consequent to the orders of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, the state government had constituted a new three-member SIT, headed by an ADGP-rank officer, in May 2021 and directed it to complete the investigations into the Kotkapura firing incident, preferably in six months.

Another SIT was assigned the work of investigating the Behbal Kalan police firing incident. Both teams have failed to make any headway in their probe in the past 18 months,” alleged Sukhraj.

About two months ago, this SIT had submitted its status report of the investigation in a court here.

The report was submitted after the court had directed the SITs on July 12 to submit the reports within two weeks. However, it was only the SIT probing the Kotkapura incident that had submitted its incomplete report in the court, stating that its investigation into the case was still underway.

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