SAD asks CM and HM to tell Punjabis what complaint they were probing against Bikram Majithia

Maheshinder Grewal avers Cong govt offering promotions and rewards to police officers to arrest Majithia)

(Says with three successive heads of BOI refusing to obey illegal orders all that remained was for CM and HM to take on the powers of a SHO)

(Demands two member committee report of DGP and Home Secretary in Jagdish Bhola case be made public)

Chandigarh, December 15 – The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) today asked chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi and home minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa to make Punjabis aware of the complaint they were probing against former minister Bikram Singh Majithia even as it asserted that the government was offering promotions and even rewards to police officers for the arrest of  Majithia.

Addressing a press conference here in reaction to the chief minister’s statement regarding the letter written by the Bureau of Investigations (BOI) head S K Asthana to the DGP in which the officer has pointed out the illegalities the BOI is being forced to commit to proceed against  Bikram Majithia, SAD Spokesman Maheshinder Singh Grewal said the letter was an indictment of the crude and illegal manner in which the government was indulging in vendetta politics.

Stating that even though the chief minister had asserted that there would not be any vendetta in his tenure “the exact opposite is happening. The situation has become such that after three successive officers of the BOI have refused to obey the illegal orders of the government all that remains is for  Channi and home minister Sukhjinder Randhawa to take over the powers of the Station House Officer (SHO)”.

Giving further details of the extra –constitutional manner in which the Congress government was conducting a witch hunt against  Majithia, the SAD leader said the original complaint against  Majithia was made by a drug dealer by the name of Jagdish Bhola. “The trial in the case is over and even conviction has been done. The chief minister and the home minister should tell how they could investigate a case which had been decided already”. He said it was condemnable that the government was trying to serve kangaroo justice in the case by dangling the carrot of promotion to an IG who was being offered the job of the head of BOI upon appointment as an ADGP. Even the Patiala SSP is also being shifted after he refused to proceed against  Majithia”.

The SAD Spokesman also gave details of how the report of the STF in the Jagdish Bhola which had been submitted to the high court in a sealed envelope had already been made public by PCC President Navjot Sidhu. He said subsequently the high court had appointed a two member committee of the State DGP and the home secretary to give its report in the case. ‘This report should also be made public”, he added.

Grewal said earlier the government did not appoint a regular DGP so that it would coerce department officers to commit illegalities. He also welcomed the chief minister’s statement that he would order a CBI inquiry into the leak of  Ashthana’s letter. He said the government should simultaneously ensure a probe into the leakage of secret meetings held at the annexe in Raj Bhawan at Chandigarh as well as the guest house at Terminal 4 airport lounge. “The role of Shekhar Shukla and Kulbir Zira in these meetings should also be probed. Also a separate case should be registered against the home minister for abetting corruption by not taking action despite proclaiming that bags full of cash used to be exchanged for conducting transfers during the tenure of Capt Amarinder Singh”.

The SAD leader also questioned the politicization of the entire probe, saying the high court had made it clear while indicting former IG Kunwar Vijay Pratap that there should not be any political or even departmental interference in the case.