Chandigarh: Less than 12 hours after a grenade blast rocked the house of a senior BJP leader in Jalandhar, the Punjab Police arrested two suspects and indicated the role of gangsters and militants working at the behest of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
At a press conference Tuesday, Special DGP Arpit Shukla did not give away the identity of the arrested duo, saying that an operation was on to nab the conspirators. He, however, added that the auto rickshaw used by the person who carried out the blast had been confiscated.
Preliminary investigations are pointing towards the conspiracy having been hatched by close associates of gangsters Lawrence Bishnoi, Zeeshan Akhtar and Pakistani gangster Shahzad Bhatti, he said.
“The blasts are being carried out on the planning of the ISI in Pakistan,” Shukla said, adding that the role of the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) also cannot be ruled out.
The high-intensity blast in BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia’s house took place at around 1 am Tuesday. CCTV footage of the incident showed that the miscreants came in an auto and hurled a grenade towards Kalia’s house. The grenade landed in the verandah causing a crater in the tiled floor and damaged some vehicles parked inside apart from shattering windows and damaging a part of the outer wall. Kalia’s house is a stone’s throw away from a police station.
Tuesday’s blast was the 16th such case in Punjab in the past seven months. Though a majority of these blasts have taken place outside the police stations and posts, this is the second time that a political leader has been targeted after a grenade was lobbed at the residence of late liquor contractor and Congress leader Rajinder Kumar in January.
The BKI had claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it had asked the contractor several times to stop selling liquor but he did not comply. Last month, a grenade was lobbed at the Thakurdwara temple in the crowded Khandwala area of Amritsar.
Tuesday’s blast incident comes within days of a grenade attack on a police naka in Kaithal, Haryana an act whose responsibility was taken by the BKI. On Monday, the banned outfit led by Pakistan-based gangster-turned-militant Harvinder Singh Rinda had also claimed responsibility for a “rocket launcher attack” on a police station in Batala. However, the police denied any such attack and damage to the police station.
Khalistan Zindabad Force (KZF), headed by Ranjit Singh Neeta, has also claimed responsibility for some of these blasts. The key operatives of these outfits include Happy Passia, Happy Jat, Gopi Ghanshampuria, Jeewan Fauji, Gurdev Jassal and Manu Agwaan.
As for the blast at Kalia’s house, the BJP leader and his family were inside the house when the incident took place. “I was sleeping and woke up to the loud noise and rattling of our windows. I thought that the power transformer down the road had blasted. Then my house help told me that something had been hurled in the verandah. I tried calling the police but there was no response. My staff then went to the police station and called them,” Kalia told media persons.
Kalia was a cabinet minister in Punjab when the Shiromani Akali Dil-Bharatiya Janata Party combine was in power in 2007-2012.
A few minutes following the blast, Chandigarh-based senior scribe Ritesh Lakhi received an email from a person, identifying himself as Jujhar Singh Azaad, claiming to be heading the Khalistan Armed Force and taking responsibility for the blast. The same mail was repeated a few hours later. On a Facebook page, another person, identifying himself as Jassa Singh, claimed responsibility for the attack on behalf of “Punjab Sovereignty Alliance”.
BJP state head Sunil Jakhar said the Punjab government had completely failed in maintaining law and order.
“The Punjab Police have been credited with ending terrorism in the state and today the same policemen have been reduced to behaving like puppets in the hands of the AAP leaders of Delhi,” Jakhar said at a press briefing in Jalandhar. “The CM had the audacity to claim in the assembly session that he was gathering information about what was happening in the meetings of the opposition leaders. He is very clear how the Punjab Police is to be used. It’s a shame.”
Congress state chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring warned that Punjab cannot afford yet “another dark era”.
“It is getting more serious day by day. The frequency and regularity of such blasts has increased. Wonder whether these blasts are creating any sound in the deaf ears of the @AAPPunjab government. @BhagwantMann Sahab, wake up, lest it is too late,” he posted on ‘X’.
Former Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal said lawlessness has crossed all bounds in Punjab. “After attacks on police stations, places of worship & vandalism of statues of Babasaheb Dr. BR Ambedkar, now the residence of a former minister & senior BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia has been subject to a grenade attack (sic),” he posted on ‘X’.
The CM, Sukhbir added, must take moral responsibility for these incidents and resign immediately.
Senior Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia said, in a video statement put out on ‘X’, that the Jalandhar police commissioner did not bother to respond to Kalia’s calls at night. He added that even the police station in Kalia’s neighbourhood did not respond to his calls. “It was only after Kalia sent his own staff to the police station that they arrived on the scene.”
Reacting to the Opposition’s attack, Punjab AAP chief Aman Arora said instead of criticising the Punjab government, the BJP at the Centre should account for its alleged links with Lawrence Bishnoi. “The BJP government has misused Section 268(1) of the CrPC to make sure that Bishnoi remains in Gujarat’s Sabarmati Jail. From there, he is operating his network and issue threats,” he said at a press briefing.
Arora added that gangster Zeeshan Akhtar, who was responsible for the attack on Kalia’s house, had earlier been implicated in the murder of Maharashtra leader Baba Siddique.
“Last month, Pakistan-based gangster Shahzad Bhatti claimed responsibility for the attack on YouTuber Roger Sandhu. Bhatti went on to thank Zeeshan Akhtar for orchestrating the crime. Evidence is also surface that Bhatti and Bishnoi are in touch with one another. How does the BJP explain sheltering Bishnoi in Gujarat?” the AAP state chief questioned.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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