Grenade attack on Nirankari prayer meet kills 3
AMRITSAR TERROR Two bikeborne men overpower the security guard, enter prayer hall, lob grenade and flee 20 INJURED Nearly 200 people were inside the hall when attack took place; no CCTVS in building, say police PREACHER AMONG DEAD Chief minister Amarin
AMRITSAR : Three people were killed and 20 others injured when two bike-borne masked youths hurled a grenade at a Nirankari congregation in Amritsar on Sunday.
The attack took place at 11.30 am at the Satsang Bhawan of the Nirankari sect in Rajasansi area. The Bhawan is about 3 km from Sri Guru Ramdas Jee International Airport.
All the victims were sect followers from nearby villages who had gathered for the Sunday weekly religious meeting. The Nirankari sect, with headquarters in Delhi, has millions of followers across the country and abroad.
State police chief Suresh Arora, who rushed to the spot along with senior officers, said it was a terror attack. “We are treating it as a terror act. This incident is against a group and not an individual. That’s why we are taking it as a terror act,” he said.
Chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh said the possibility of involvement of Isi-backed Khalistani/kashmiri militant groups in the attack could not be ruled out. Preliminary investigations had so far revealed that two men, one of them with a flowing beard, with covered faces, allegedly forced their way into the building by brandishing a pistol, he added. One of them detained the sewadar at the gate and lobbed the grenade into the prayer room. Later, the duo fled on a motorcycle.
A crater, with a 3” diameter, was formed by the impact of the explosion. It was being examined by the forensic team. The safety valve of the grenade has also been found and was being examined, said the CM.
“The duo were around 6-ft tall and the grenade was hurled towards the stage. There were around 200 devotees inside the hall,” said inspector general (border range) Surinder Pal Singh Parmar. No CCTV was installed on the premises, preliminary investigations found, he added. After the incident, the Bhawan was sealed by the police and security was stepped up at other “Nirankari Bhavans” in the state.
The CM said he would ensure that the culprits were apprehended. “Though the state had been hit by a series of cases of targeted attacks since 2015/16, this was the first attempt, in a long time, to disturb the peace in the state through indiscriminate killings. Pakistan is continuing with its nefarious activities to disturb the state’s peace,” Amarinder said.
He pointed out that 15 such terror modules had been busted in the past 18 months, with Kashmiri terror links also indicated in some instances, as evidenced in the arrest of Kashmiri students from Jalandhar and in the Maqsudan police station grenade blast case.
The chief minister announced a compensation of Rs 5 lakh each to the kin of the dead and directed the district administration to provide the best possible medical care, free of cost, to the injured. He, meanwhile, appealed to the people not to panic and maintain peace and law and order.
Those injured are Sarabjit Singh, Avtar Singh, Kashmir Singh, Gurpiyar Singh, Mehakjit Kaur, Sukhwinder Kaur, Dilsher Singh, Satinder Kumar, Desa Singh, Surjit Kaur, Gagandeep Singh, Kulwinder Kaur, Akashdeep Singh, Harwinder Singh, Jasbir Kaur, Lal Bihari, Harjot Singh, Kuldeep Singh, Nirmal Kaur, Rajwant Kaur and Simranjit Kaur. Of the injured, three are in a critical condition. They are undergoing treatment in a private hospital here.
The Sunday attack took place amid Punjab being on high alert following an input claiming that “a group of six to seven JEM terrorists were in Punjab and were ‘planning’ to move to Delhi.” Moreover, the security agencies were also on alert after four persons snatched an SUV from its driver at gunpoint near Madhopur in Pathankot district a few days back.