SIT quizzes then special principal secy to exCM on Bargari firing

: The special investigation team (SIT) probing the Bargari police firing of 2015 questioned Gagandeep Singh Brar, then special principal secretary to chief minister, Parkash Singh Badal, and Sonali Giri, then additional deputy commissioner (general), Faridkot, in Chandigarh on Wednesday.

Sources said Brar was mostly questioned on the Kotkapura firing. ADGP Prabodh Kumar heads the SIT. According to justice (retd) Ranjit Singh Commission Report, Brar, now special secretary, animal husbandry, fisheries, and dairy development, had made Parkash Singh Badal speak with the then Kotkapura MLA Mantar Singh Brar in the middle of the night, before the Kotkapura firing incident took place on October 14, 2015.

“The name of Brar, the then special principal secretary to the CM, was revealed by a witness, speaking to the commission in confidence, as the one through whom the CM had called up Mantar Brar. Brar had, in fact, gone to the house of the CM in the middle of the night and made him speak with the district administration ,” the report had said.

The report had also added that Brar was summoned by the commission, but he had blocked all relevant questions addressed to him.

“The commission is of the considered view that this witness was in the know of complete details and has smartly taken shelter behind his memory loss,” the report had added. HTC