HC seeks record of Salwinder’s premature retirement

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab and Haryana high court on Tuesday directed the Punjab government to produce record, which became basis for the government to prematurely retire former Gurdaspur superintendent of police (SP) Salwinder Singh.

The order was passed by high court bench of justice Jaswant Singh stating that before proceedings further with Singh’s petition the court would examine the instructions whereby a committee, which recommended his retirement was constituted and also the record which became basis for prematurely retiring him.

The order recommending the retirement of the controversial officer was passed by a committee headed by then chief secretary Karan Avtar Singh on November 9, 2017. The retirement order was passed on November 21.

Posted as the Gurdaspur SP, Salwinder shot into limelight after he was purportedly kidnapped by terrorists hours before the Pathankot airbase attack in January 2016. He was quizzed repeatedly by various investigating agencies and was finally given a clean chit. Recruited in 1986 as assistant sub-inspector (ASI), Singh become SP in 2013, but remained mired in controversies.

He has argued that the committee did not consider annual confidential reports (ACRS) of his entire tenure and took into account some departmental proceedings or criminal cases, which have not even attained finality. Singh was victimized as he spoke in media about the terror attack incident in which he had given prior information of his kidnap by some armed men, the court was told adding that it had left force red faced.