Withdraw cases against Dalits or face stir: SAD to govt

The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Tuesday asked the Congress government to withdraw all cross cases registered against Dalits who were attacked and fired upon by Punjab Shiv Sena "goons" when they had peacefully congregated to rename the Gol Chowk in Phagwara as Samvidhan Chowk within one week or face a state-level agitation on this issue.

The Scheduled Caste wing of the SAD, led by Gulzar Singh Ranike, demanded immediate arrest of all perpetrators of the "unprovoked" attack on Dalits on April 13. Ranike pointed out that a case had been registered against 16 persons but only four of them had been arrested so far.

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Other members of the wing, including Sohan Singh Thandal, Satwinder Kaur Dhaliwal, Mohinder Kaur Josh and Pawan Kumar Tinu, demanded that the Congress government should act against all Shiv Sena leaders who had instigated the attack on the Dalit community and withdraw all gunmen and escort vehicles given to them. Ranike said the licences of Shiv Sena leaders should be permanently confiscated. He said it should also be ascertained why so many gunmen had been given to such persons and the officers responsible for this should also be proceeded against.

Tinu said it was clear that the entire incident had been pre-planned and electricity connections in the area were disconnected before "indiscriminate firing" against the Dalit community. "Around 40 shots were fired but the police personnel deployed at the spot remained mute spectators and did not take any action to rein in the miscreants. What was even more shocking was that cross cases had been registered against Dalit activists and their children to intimidate them. This despite the fact that 47 out of 56 councillors of Phagwara municipal committee signed a public resolution in favour of renaming Gol Chowk as Samvidhan Chowk," he said.