To take up the issue of release of Sikh prisoners languishing in various jails across the country even after completing their prison term, the Shiromani Akali Dal would soon meet Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
“A delegation of senior Akali leaders would vehemently plead the case of these Sikh prisoners before the Centre for securing their release,” Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal said while speaking to the reporters on the sidelines of a function on Wednesday. “I have already taken up this matter with the respective State Governments and the Centre for release of these prisoners,” he said, adding that the final call on this issue was to come from the Centre. When asked about the reports of rejection of these cases by the Centre, he said that the State Government has not yet received any communication on this matter from the Centre.
Only a fortnight ago, Badal had sought “premature release” of 13 life convicts, five of them are jailed in the assassination case of Punjab’s former Chief Minister Beant Singh and one in bomb blast in New Delhi in September 1993, in which nine people were killed and 25 others, including then Youth Congress president MS Bitta, were injured. Badal wrote separate letters to his counterparts in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Karnataka, Gujarat and administrators of Delhi and Chandigarh Union Territory seeking premature release of 13 life convicts hailing from Punjab, presently lodged under TADA Act in the jails of various States across the country for the past several years. Badal has sought “their prompt release on humanitarian grounds”.