’81 hijacking case: Two Dal Khalsa activists acquitted
NEWDELHI/AMRITSAR: A Delhi court on Monday acquitted two Dal Khalsa activists accused of hijacking a Delhi-Srinagar Indian Airlines flight (IC-423) and forcing it to land at Lahore in Pakistan on September 29, 1981.
Following a commando operation, the 111 passengers and six crew members were rescued and the two accused, Tejinder Pal Singh and Satnam Singh, along with their three accomplices were arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment. They had hijacked the domestic flight demanding the release of militant leader and then Damdami Taksal chief Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale.
Additional sessions judge Ajay Pandey gave them benefit of doubt and said that the prosecution had “miserably failed” to prove its case against the accused Tejinder Pal Singh, 66, and Satnam Singh, 67, associated with the radical Sikh outfit, “beyond reasonable doubt”.
After being released from Kot Lakhpat jail in 1994, all five sought political asylum in various countries. Two of them, Karan Singh (Jammu and Kashmir) and Jasbir Singh (Khanna, Punjab) were able to get asylum in Switzerland, while Gajinder Singh (Chandigarh), who was the Dal Khalsa president from 2001-05, has been getting extension to live in Pakistan.
Denied asylum, Satnam and Tejinder Pal were deported from the US and Canada, respectively, to India. Satnam was discharged by the court of additional chief metropolitan magistrate (ACMM), New Delhi, on the basis of the serving life sentence in Pakistan, after he surrendered in 1999. However, the court dismissed their plea when Tejinder Pal sought a similar discharge order.
In 2011, Delhi Police charged them under various sections of the IPC - 121 (waging war against the government of India), 121A (conspiring to commit certain offences against the state), 124A (sedition) and 120B (criminal conspiracy). It submitted a supplementary chargesheet against them.
In 2017, the Delhi high court also dismissed their plea seeking a stay on the sessions court order and asked the trial court to proceed with the matter. Both were granted bail in July last year. Charges were framed against both under section of waging war against state but other charges were dropped this May.
Satnam, who belonged to Paonta Sahib, was the Himachal Pradesh unit president of the Shiromani Akali Dal till 1978 when the Dal Khalsa was formed. He was president of the Dal Khalsa from 2005-07 and continues to be an active member of the outfit.
Tejinder Pal, who had joined the Dal Khalsa in 1981, is back to his hometown of Jalandhar where he runs a shop of religious literature. Though he is a member of the outfit, he is not active in politics.