Strongly condemning “goondaism” resorted to by the Akali activist in full public view in Tarn Taran, the People’s Party of Punjab chief and former Finance Minister Manpreet Badal on Thursday said that such incidents contributed to the already prevailing sense of insecurity in the State. “This shocking incident could not just be termed as merely rivalry between the two alliance partners as it is an extreme example as to what extent the police has been politicised,” he said.
Manpreet said that the victim in this case happened to be the brother of local Bodies Minister Anil Joshi in the Akali Dal-BJP Government who had to go to the media to highlight the deteriorating situation in the State. “It is not just only the attack but the police behaviour that had sent tremors across the people as the police official has been caught on the camera standing there and enjoying the beating up of BJP leaders by Akali activists who also brandished weapons and opened fire. The police official concerned did not care to intervene,” he pointed.
Manpreet said that the SIT constituted by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal will look into only into one aspect of the case. “This incident has many dimensions with far reaching ramifications for governance. This is the result of power enjoyed by the selected Akali leaders who are not accountable,” he added.
PPP chief said that Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal had been introducing police and administrative reforms but going by the functioning of the law and order machinery as evident from this incident, it is clear that there had been no change at the grassroots and the situation continued to worsen due to political interference. “All along, there have been reports of the Akali activists taking law and order into their own hands and here is an extreme example in which the victim happened to be from the alliance partner,” he said.