CHANDIGARH, Aug 30: The Shiromani Akali Dal on Tuesday said its chief Sukhbir Singh Badal has not been served summons by the Punjab Police’s Special Investigation Team (SIT) in the 2015 Kotkapura police firing incident, but he was ready to cooperate in the investigation.
Badal asked the SIT to clarify whether the summons for his appearance before the probe team being circulated in the media was issued by it.
Shiromani Akali Dal leader and spokesperson Arshdeep Singh Kler on Tuesday said Badal had not been served summons “personally”.
The SIT had summoned the SAD chief to appear before it on August 30 for questioning in the firing incident.
Badal, who was the deputy chief minister and also held home affairs portfolio when the incident took place in 2015, was asked by the SIT to appear at Punjab Police Officers’ Institute here with relevant records.
Kler claimed that Badal was to appear in a court in Zira in Ferozepur in some other case on Tuesday.
“The summons is circulated on electronic and social media that Badal has been summoned in the Kotkapura firing case. However, the summons has not been served to Badal personally,” the SAD spokesperson claimed.
Kler said the SAD chief has written to the SIT to clarify whether the summons has been issued by it.
“If it (summons) has been issued by the SIT, then it should give us a next date and we are ready to cooperate in the probe,” he, adding that the SAD chief has gone to Zira to appear in the court there.
The SIT, probing the 2015 Kotkapura police firing incident, had earlier questioned former director general of police Sumedh Singh Saini here.
SIT head Additional Director General of Police L K Yadav had summoned the former state police chief for appearance before the probe team.
Saini has been named as an accused in the 2015 Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan police firing incidents in Faridkot.
Last month, the Punjab and Haryana High Court had dismissed a bunch of petitions filed by Saini and other accused police officers against the Punjab Police’s probe into the 2015 Behbal Kalan firing case.
Saini and others had demanded quashing of the FIR and chargesheet filed by the SIT and transfer of the case to the CBI.
The incidents related to the theft of a ‘bir’ (copy) of the Guru Ganth Sahib, putting up handwritten sacrilegious posters and torn pages of the holy book found scattered at Bargari had taken place in Faridkot in 2015.
These incidents had triggered protests in Faridkot. Two persons were killed in Behbal Kalan while some people were injured at Kotkapura in Faridkot after police fired at protesters in October 2015. (PTI)
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