Sonipat:
Sarabjit Singh, accused in the murder of Lakhbir Singh near farmers'
protest at Kundli border, being taken back to police custody after the
court ordered for his 7-day remand, in Sonipat, Saturday, Oct. 16, 2021.
Photo: PTI
New Delhi: A second member of
the Sikhs’ Nihang order was arrested and two more surrendered before
Sonipat Police in connection with the lynching of a Dalit farm labourer
at a farmers’ protest site.
Sarabjit Singh, arrested on Friday for the brutal killing of Lakhbir
Singh, was produced before a Sonipat court in Haryana and remanded in
police custody for seven days.
Hours later, Narain Singh, who is also a Nihang, was arrested by the
Amritsar Rural police at Amarkot village in Amritsar district, police
said. In Amritsar, Narain Singh claimed he had informed the police that
he was surrendering. Talking to the media before his arrest, he was
unrepentant and said that Lakhbir Singh had been “punished for
sacrilege”. He said that the accused in the Bargari sacrilege incident
in Punjab were yet to be arrested, but now if somebody will commit “such
a heinous crime he would be punished on the spot”.
Narain Singh was given a robe of honour and a garland of currency
notes by some people when he paid obeisance in the Amarkot Gurdwara
before his arrest.
Late Saturday evening, two
more belonging to the Nihang order, who hailed from Punjab’s Fatehgarh
Sahib, surrendered before the Sonipat police in Kundli. They interacted
with the media at the Singhu border before surrendering.
Indian Express has reported
that after the latest surrenders by men identified as Bhagwant Singh
and Govind Preet Singh, they were taken into custody from Singhu border
after both surrendered and “confessed” to their role in the murder.
According to police, Sarabjit Singh claimed the involvement of a few more people in the killing.
National Commission for Scheduled Caste Chairperson Vijay Sampla said
the protesting farmers cannot wash their hands off such incidents.
“Their role is the same as that of culprits. They cannot wash their
hands off the incidents,” he said after meeting around 15 Dalit outfits
which submitted a memorandum demanding stringent action against the
culprits.
Sampla has also sought a report from Haryana police into the incident.
The SKM had, however, issued a statement on Friday distancing itself
from the incident and said that it wanted to make it clear that “both
the parties to the incident”, the Nihang group and the victim, have no
relation with the Morcha.
Farmer union leaders asserted on Saturday that the incident will have
no impact on the agitation and said they will upgrade security by
installing CCTV cameras and increasing the number of volunteers at the
protest sites.
The body of Lakhbir Singh was found on Friday tied to a barricade at
the Singhu border with a hand chopped off and multiple wounds caused by
sharp-edged weapons. Hours after the crime, Sarabjit Sigh, wearing the
blue robes of the Nihang order, claimed that he had “punished” the
victim for “desecrating” a Sikh holy book.
Questioning his claim, the victim’s wife Jaspreet Kaur and sister Raj
Kaur said Lakhbir Singh “had a deep respect for the holy Guru Granth
Sahib.” His family has called for a probe into the death, as The Wire had reported earlier.
The
mortal remains of Lakhbir Singh were cremated at his native village in
Punjab’s Tarn Taran amid tight security in the presence of his family
members. No Sikh priest was present to perform Ardas (Sikh religious
prayer) and no one from his village, Cheema Kalan, attended the last
rites, PTI has reported.
(With PTI inputs)
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