New Delhi: A day after the Amritsar Police said it would take legal action against social media handles of the Bharatiya Janata Party for “misleading” the public on the statement of its police commissioner, the Punjab government Friday shunted him out.
Amritsar Commissioner of Police Gurpreet Singh Bhullar has been asked to report to the office of the state’s police chief, Gaurav Yadav, while the home department has handed over the reins of policing the holy city to IPS officer Harmanbir Singh Gill. He was already posted in Amritsar in the capacity of DIG for the Border Range.
A promoted IPS officer from the state police service, Bhullar was believed to enjoy a good equation with the Aam Aadmi Party-led Punjab government. Appointed Amritsar Commissioner of Police in November 2023, he was removed in just seven months in June 2024 and brought back again just three months later. He has also served as police commissioner in Ludhiana and Jalandhar.
The development comes hours after the Amritsar Police took strong exception to the two videos posted by BJP social media handles, claiming that Bhullar had suggested that members of terror modules busted by the city police under him had connections with the protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar organised by the Cockroach Janata Party.
“Major revelation: ISI-backed module behind the Jantar Mantar protest!” the BJP said on its X timeline, visible until Thursday evening. “Punjab Police (Amritsar) Commissioner Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar has revealed that a Pakistan-based, ISI-backed module was active behind the protest held at Jantar Mantar. The investigation uncovered that this module was using 15-year-old minors—lured by the promise of money—to conduct reconnaissance on police and security installations and to plot attacks against them. Hear the full story directly from the Police Commissioner,” the post said.
An Amritsar Police spokesperson had said that the handles were showing “trimmed” videos of the press conference and that proceedings under the Information Technology Act, 2000, would be initiated in response.
The spokesperson had said that what the police chief had actually said was that arrested module members had visited Jantar Mantar for reconnaissance and planned to target the protesters with petrol bombs on the instructions of their cross-border handlers.
The Amritsar Police said his video statement to news agency ANI was edited to give a misleading context.
“No statement was made that the arrested persons participated in the protests or that the Jantar Mantar protesters had any links with the module,” the Amritsar Police had said.
The police spokesperson said changed background visuals, selective trimming of the video, and the accompanying captions gave “a different and erroneous impression” that the arrested individuals were associated with the Jantar Mantar protests.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)