A day after the Punjab Police personnel lashed out lathis at the agitating Patiala’s Punjabi University students, Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Friday ordered probe in the matter.
Badal had asked the Patiala Deputy Commissioner to ascertain the causes and circumstances which led to the incident and submit the inquiry report.Instructions have also been issued to take strict action or register a case against any police officer or official who have committed laxity in dealing with the incident.Violent clashes between hundreds of students and police in Punjabi University left around 14 people, including nine students and five cops, injured. The students were protesting against lack of hostel facility for MPhil and PhD scholars in the university.
The clashes occurred when police tried to intervene into the matter and asked the students to end their protest demanding various facilities at the varsity. After the police fired tear gas shells to disperse the students who resorted to stone-pelting.Describing the clash as “an unfortunate incident”, Badal said that it was absolutely “undesirable and unwarranted”.Badal, interacting with the media on the sidelines of a function organised to mark the 18th death anniversary of Subedar Bapu Kartar Singh Dhaliwal, the father of Cabinet Minister Surjit Singh Rakhra at Rakhra village, submitted that he has already ordered a probe in the matter.
“I have asked the Deputy Commissioner to ascertain the causes and circumstances which led to this incident and submit the inquiry report. If any police officer or official have committed laxity in dealing with this incident, he or she would not be spared and brought to book as per the law of the land,” said Badal.
The Chief Minister said that maintaining law and order in the state was the top priority of the state government and all out efforts were being made in this regard. “SAD-BJP Government in the State have always upheld ethos of communal harmony, peace and amity in the state due to which the Punjabis have time and again reposed their faith in its policies,” he said.