As many as 60 leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) were taken into preventive custody on Monday after they tried to violate prohibitory orders during a protest against alleged mining scams.
AAP leaders, led by its Punjab unit president and Sangrur MP Bhagwant Mann and the leader of Opposition in Punjab Vidhan Sabha Sukhpal Singh Khaira, had announced to stage a dharna (sit-in) outside Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh’s residence in protest of the corruption charges against him and his Minister.
The leaders were protesting to demand that the trials of corruption cases against Capt Amarinder be shifted outside the State and investigation of mining scams against Power an Irrigation Minister Rana Gurjeet Singh be handed over to the CBI.
The protesters tried to jump barricades to reach outside the Chief Minister’s residence for their demonstration and violated prohibitory orders imposed under Section 144 in the area, the police said. Police also used water cannons to disperse them near the MlAs hostel gate.
About 60 protesters, including Mann, Khaira and MlA of AAP’s ally lok Insaaf Party Simarjit Singh Bains, were then rounded off and taken to Sector 17 police station in a police bus, the police said.
During the protest, Mann told reporters, “We demand investigation of corruption cases involving ludhiana city centre and mining scams be handed over to the CBI for trial outside the State as a free and fair trial is impossible here. Everyone is being given a clean chit.”
Khaira said: “We want trial of these cases outside Punjab. We want truth must come out and justice should be done. If need be, AAP will fight these cases right up to the Supreme Court.”
Punjab Vigilance Bureau had filed a closure report in alleged over Rs 1,000 crore ludhiana city centre scam in a court in ludhiana last month.
In another case, giving a clean chit to Rana Gurjeet, the Justice (retd) JS Narang Commission, probing allegations of irregularities in the sand mining auctions, had said that there was no loss of revenue and the auction was carried out in a transparent manner through e-tendering process.
The Chief Minister had earlier ordered constitution of the one-man commission following allegations involving, Rana Gurjeet in the sand mining auctions conducted by the Department of Mining in May.
Khaira, addressing a Press conference at Chandigarh on August 30, had asked Capt Amarinder to either quit as Chief Minister or unilaterally hand over investigations and trials of both corruption cases of Amritsar and ludhiana to the CBI for trial outside the State of Punjab. “Neither the CM has resigned nor has handed over the investigation to CBI, so the MlAs and office bearers of AAP were forced to hold a ‘dharna’ against Capt Amarinder,” he said.
He also asked Capt Amarinder to fulfil his promise of ‘zero tolerance’ against corruption by sacking Rana Gurjeet from the Cabinet.