Ludhiana: The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) led by its leaders staged a protest outside the mini-secretariat, demanding an FIR and arrest of Lok Insaaf Party MLA Simarjit Singh Bains after a woman levelled charges of rape against him.
A big ruckus was witnessed on the main road outside the mini secretariat as the SAD leaders and workers tried to make their way towards the police commissioner’s office but were not allowed to do so by the heavy police force deployed on the spot. The protesters then sat outside the mini-secretariat and started raising slogans against Bains and others demanding police action.
Senior police officials tried to pacify them and convince them to lift their dharna and even told them that a delegation of six SAD leaders can go and meet the CP to submit their memorandum. But they refused and later on handed over the memorandum to ADCP-3 Sameer Verma.
Meanwhile, lashing out against Bains, Maheshinder Singh Grewal, senior vice-president of SAD, said, “We feel very pained and sad over the trauma being faced by the victim who is running from pillar to post to get justice, but no action is being taken by the police. Despite a written complaint by the victim on November 16, till date the police has not registered a case, which is in violation of the laws laid down by the Supreme Court. Non-registration of a case amounts to contempt of court and the police is violating all provisions of law by repeatedly taking the victim from her house to the Police Lines on the pretext of recording her statements and cross questioning her. No woman can be called to the police station for such purpose, and this is being done to allegedly humiliate her.”
According to SAD MLA Sharanjit Singh Dhillon, “Non-registration of a case by the police against the accused is apparently at the behest of the top authorities of the government merely to help Simarjit Singh Bains to use all his might to threaten the victim, cause harm to her or to buy out the conscious of the victim. As per law, victim and witnesses should be protected from the accused , particularly when the accused is a powerful man, so that evidence is not tampered with. But here in this case the accused is being given a free run. Moreover, when the victim has clearly told the chief minister, DGP and commissioner of police how her life was being threatened and she was being pressurized to step back through brother of the accused (Pamma) and PA of the accused (Gogi Sharma), but still the police has not taken any action.”
Gurdeep Singh Gosha, district president of Youth Akali Dal, said, “It is shocking that the police is adopting such attitude of shielding the accused, who already is so notorious. It is very strange that why chief minister Amrinder Singh is turning a blind eye towards this serious crime. May be he and other Congress leaders have some political compulsions to save Bains and is depriving the victim of her right to seek justice. Why doesn’t the CM adopts the same standards as he did in the rape case in Hoshiarpur, in which every action was done in a fast track mode. It is very shocking that local Congress leaders too have gone into hiding and refraining to utter even a single word against this heinous act committed by Bains and his associates.”
Other SAD leaders and workers present in the protest included Harbajan Singh Dang,Gurmeet Singh Kular, Surinder Kaur Dyal, Kuldeep Singh Khalsa, Nirman Singh, Surinder Singh Chauhan, Angrez Singh Sandhu, Tanvir Singh Dhaliwal, Prabhjot Singh Dhaliwal, Bablu Lopoke, Rajesh Mishra, Kuldeep Singh Khalsa, Jagbir Singh Sokhi and Gurpreet Kaur Sibia.
According to Gagandeep Singh Sunny Kainth, spokesperson of LIP, “The protest by Shiromani Akali Dal and their former coalition partner BJP is just a drama. The charges being levelled by them are totally baseless and it is a big conspiracy hatched by SAD against our leader Simarjit Singh Bains and they are habitual of doing such dirty politics. Earlier also, during their rule they registered dozens of false FIRs against our leader and this too is another attempt by them. But public is aware of everything and they will give them a befitting reply in the next elections for the low-level of politics they are playing.”