Kotkapura chargesheet to ‘cover up’ Ajnala incident, claims opposition in Punjab

LUDHIANA: After the chargesheet naming former Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and former home minister Sukhbir Singh Badal was pn Friday submitted to the court by the SIT probing the 2015 Kotkapura police firing and sacrilege case, opposition leaders in the city have on Saturday hit hard against the Aam Aadmi Party-led state government, calling the chargesheet a “diversionary tactic” to “distract” the voters from the Ajnala incident.
The Shiromani Akali Dal refuted all claims made in the chargesheet.
SAD leader Maheshinder Singh Grewal said, “I have never seen this in my life that first names are decided and then chargesheet is written to prove them accused. The government was adamant to prove them responsible, so they wrote it accordingly.”
He called the move “politically motivated” to gain benefits in the upcoming elections. He claimed Sukhbir Badal was not in India during the Kotkapura incident, and questioned how he could have conspired with former DGP Sumedh Saini.
The Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party also questioned the timing of the chargesheet.
Congress district president Sanjay Talwar said, “I think this is being done to cover incidents like Ajnala violence which is a big slap on the face of the state government. There is no law and order in state and in these conditions, the CM is organising the investment summit.”
Adding that the Congress too wants to punish those behind the incident, he claimed the way the chargesheet was filed a day after the Ajnala incident hinted that AAP wanted to divert the attention from it.
BJP spokesperson Gurdeep Singh Gosha said, “The government couldn’t handle situation in Ajnala when protestors took law in their hands, and now they have brought in this chargesheet.”