Dismiss plea of ex-MLA to be a party to case, says CBI

MOHALI : A CBI special court in Mohali will decide on November 6, whether former Rampura Phul MLA Harbans Singh Jalal has the locus standi to be impleaded as a party before it decides on the closure report that the probe agency has filed in the 2015 Bargari sacrilege case.

During arguments on the locus standi of Jalal, the CBI pressed for dismissal of application ‘with costs’, saying that he was a complete ‘alien and stranger’ to the case. “He never appeared before the CBI or shared any leads with any investigating agency,” it said in court on Wednesday. Making his case, Jalal has said, “I am a Sikh and my religious sentiments were hurt due to sacrilege.”

Jalal had moved the application after the CBI filed a closure report in three cases of sacrilege — theft of a ‘bir’ of Guru Granth Sahib from Burj Jawahar Singh Wala village on June 1, 2015; putting up of hand-written sacrilegious posters in Bargari and Burj Jawahar Singh Wala on September 25 the same year, and torn pages of ‘bir’ being found at Bargari on October 12, 2015 — against the accused. The previous SADBJP government had handed over the cases to the CBI in November 2015.

The complainants’ counsel Gagan Pradeep Singh Bal accused Jalal of using the application for ‘political and personal gains’. Elaborating on his claim, Bal told the court that after filing the application, Jalal filed papers to contest the by-election from Dakha and sought votes for fighting for the cause of Sikhs. On November 6, the court will also hear arguments on the CBI’s application to keep the closure report in abeyance.