Wanted for dera follower’s murder, ‘BKI ultra’ nabbed

LUCK NOW/ CHANDIGARH: Police from Punjab and the Uttar Pradesh anti-terror squad (ATS) arrested another alleged terrorist of Babbar Khalsa International, Jaswant Singh, alias Kala, from a farmhouse in Sora Mau in Unnao district, 50 km from UP capital Lucknow, on Thursday morning.

In Chandigarh, a Punjab police spokesperson said Kala had masterminded the targeted killings of Paras Mani, a religious leader and head of Dera Baba Farid, at Khukhrana village of Moga in 2014; and of Gurdev Singh, a Dera Sacha Sauda follower, in Burj Jawahar Singh Wala village in Faridkot last year. He is also accused of murder of Lakha Singh, a controversial religious preacher, in Hanumangarh, Rajasthan, last year.

He was arrested on revelations made by Balwant Singh, who was staying with a false identity of a granthi at a Lucknow gurdwara for the past five years and was arrested on Wednesday, the UP ATS said. He was hiding in the farmhouse for the past few weeks after killing a supporter of an anti-BKI group in Punjab around two months ago, it is alleged.

Both were produced in a Lucknow court for transit remand and handed to the Punjab police.

Additional superintendent of police (ASP) of the ATS, Rajesh Sahani said Kala was “one of the most active” among Sikh hardliners who support a separate nation of Khalistan.

Police in Punjab said Kala, who hails from Sonewala village of Muktsar district, is a “close associate” of Jagtar Singh Hawara, former BKI chief in India, who is in jail for the assassination of the then Punjab chief minister Beant Singh in 1995.

ASP Sahani also said Kala was involved in three killings, in Hanumangarh (Rajasthan), and Faridkot and Nawanshahr (Punjab) in 2016 and this year. He was earlier arrested on sedition charges from Delhi’s Modi Colony in 2008 and on similar charges in 2005. Punjab police said Kala was arrested by the special cell of Delhi police in March 2008 for alleged involvement in a conspiracy to kill controversial preacher Piara Singh Bhaniara.

The spokesperson said Kala had “stitched together a terrorist module comprising of Gurpreet Singh Gopi, Avtar Singh Pamma and Ashok Kumar Vohra, alias Amna Seth, all from Ferozepur, who are under arrest.

It is alleged that Balwant, “who kept moving between his deras in Tanda in Hoshiarpur (Punjab) and another one in Lucknow”, supplied weapons to Kala.

HELD BY PUNJAB AND UTTAR PRADESH COPS ON CUE FROM ANOTHER ALLEGED MILITANT ARRESTED IN LUCKNOW ON WEDNESDAY