The cases of sacrilege in poll-bound Punjab continue unabated with the latest incident of sacrilege of holy scriptures of Guru Granth Sahib and Bhagwat Geeta taking place here on Saturday morning.
The torn pages of two holy scriptures were found from a distributary of the Bist-Doab canal near Nahla village, triggering protests and roadblocks by the people.
The torn pages were first seen by Prince Pal Singh a local Sikh youth who was returning from Gurdwara. Three scriptures of Guru Granth Sahibs, from which the pages appear to have been torn, were also recovered from near the canal.
large number of people reached the spot as news spread around. The Sikhs held Prayers and youth jumped into the distributory to take out the torn pages. A large number of people blocked trafic at Kapurthala road at Jalandhar.
Heavy police force was deployed to thwart any untoward incident. The protestors raised slogans against SAD-BJP Government and Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and his son Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Bada for their alleged failure to prevent such cases.
Punjab remained on the boil after sacrilege incident in Bargari in Faridkot, in October last year and then quite a few incidents were reported from across the State. Two Sikh men were also killed in Behbal Kalan village, district Faridkot, when police opened fire on protestors who were sitting on dharna against the sacrilege incident.
Speaking to reporters in Phillaur, Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal strongly condemned the sacrilege of holy scriptures at Jalandhar and said that such heinous acts deserve widespread condemnation and persons indulging in such acts should be given exemplary punishment.
State BJP president Vijay Sampla too condemned the incident saying some miscreants were trying to disturb communal harmony in the State and this would not be tolerated. He said people of the state should foil such incidents.
The State Aam Aadmi Party too reacted and condemned the incidents of the sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib and Bhagwat Gita. State Convener of AAP, Gurpreet Ghuggi said that it indicates towards the deep-rooted conspiracy to disturb the peace of Punjab.
“It is highly deplorable, condemnable and unfortunate of that some the persons have gone religiously bankrupt and did such a heinous crime of sacrilege, which is beyond pardonable”, he said, adding it is the responsibly of the state government to nab such persons and expose them before the public.
It is duty of the State Government and management of Gurdwaras to provide adequate security to Guru Granth Sahib, so that such an incident does not get repeated, he added.