Photographs show links of hardened criminals with top Akali leadership Punjab CM

(Eds: Updating with SAD reaction, adding more matter)
    Chandigarh, Dec 9 (PTI) Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Monday said he has ordered a probe into the alleged links between hardened criminals or gangsters and top Akali leadership after he received photographs showing a criminal posing with SAD leaders.
     According to a government statement issued here, the photographs received by the chief minister show Harjinder Singh alias Bittu Sarpanch, against whom several criminal cases were registered under the IPC and the Arms Act, posing with SAD bosses, including former chief minister Parkash Singh Badal, SAD chief Sukhbir Badal and Union minister Harsimrat Badal.
     Bittu reportedly provided shelter to members of the notorious Gurpreet Sekhon gang in the past, DGP Dinkar Gupta said.
     On Saturday, Amarinder ordered a probe by the DGP while taking note of media reports of alleged nexus between gangsters and politicians in the state.
     Amarinder had also directed the state police chief to inquire into the "allegations as made out from the documents/photos" that have been submitted to him and which “prove to the contrary” of the allegations made by opposition parties.
     The chief minister on Monday said he ordered probe after receiving photographs, "clearly showing links of hardened criminals/gangsters with top Akali leadership".
     Amarinder said before ordering the inquiry, he had apprised the governor about these photographs, which, if proved to be authentic, would expose the role, nature and extent of Akali involvement in "patronizing criminals and gangsters" in the state.
     The evidence was serious and required a full-fledged police investigation, and he had asked the DGP to leave no stone unturned into completing the same at the earliest, he said.
     Amarinder said he would get to the bottom of the matter, and would not allow anyone found guilty of such charges to go scot free.
     Reacting to the chief minister's claims, the SAD also released a photograph of Bittu, purportedly seen with Amarinder Singh during poll campaigning in 2017.
     SAD chief Sukhbir Badal, in a release here, claimed that Amarinder is seen inducting Bittu into the Congress party during electioneering in 2017.
     He stated that the chief minister's statement in which he tried to link Bittu with Akali leaders was a "classic case of the pot calling the kettle black".
     Badal said it was strange that the chief minister had decided to release a few old photographs of Bittu in random clicks with SAD leaders but forgotten that he had allegedly given “political shelter” to Bittu on the eve of government formation in 2017 by inducting him into the Congress party.
     Countering Badal's charge, Amarinder said Bittu was never a Congressman and had always been an Akali leader working for their party and having close ties with Badal junior.
     The Akalis had reportedly tried to infiltrate many of their loyalists into the Congress ahead of the 2017 assembly elections and Bittu was one of them, Amarinder said in another statement.
     Earlier, Akalis alleged that Jails minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa had links with notorious gangster Jaggu Bhagwanpuria through his close associates and an extortion racket was being run by hardcore criminal under the patronage of the minister, a charge denied by the minister.
     Responding to the allegation, Amarinder claimed that the SAD had no proof of any involvement of Randhawa or any other Congress minister or leader with gangsters and criminals.
     "On the contrary, the evidence against the Akalis was documented and needed to be thoroughly probed," he said, adding that action would be taken against anyone found guilty.
     The chief minister lashed out at the SAD leadership, accusing it of "hobnobbing" with gangsters and criminals for their own vested interests while Punjab and its people lived "under a blanket of deep fear and insecurity for 10 years under their misrule".
     According to inputs available with the police, Bittu is also allegedly close to Jeet Mohinder Singh, the former SAD MLA from Talwandi Sahib.
     "Inputs available with the Organised Crime Control Unit, Punjab, also reveal that Bittu is reported to have been providing shelter to members of the notorious Gurpreet Sekhon gang in the past," DGP Gupta said, adding that Bittu has been named in several criminal cases related to drugs, murder, dacoity, etc. PTI CHS SNE
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)