Ludhiana DIG transferred for ‘threatening’ Congress MLA
The officer has now been posted as joint director, Punjab Police Academy (PPA), Phillaur.
A senior IPS officer Yurinder Singh Hayer, who was posted as deputy inspector general (DIG), Ludhiana range, was transferred on Wednesday for using “threatening tone while illegally summoning Congress MLA from Jalandhar West Sushil Rinku.”
The officer has now been posted as joint director, Punjab Police Academy (PPA), Phillaur. According to the MLA, the matter pertains to a land dispute case, wherein a local hotelier and former NRI Sabha president Kamaljeet Hayer recently got orders of possession of a chunk of land in Bhargo Camp area through a court. But the MLA has been opposing the possession on the ground that many poor families were having shops and houses on the land for the past 35 years. He is demanding that before displacing these families, alternate arrangements should be made for them.
“But around 15 days ago, I got a call from the DIG asking me to meet him in Country Inn hotel owned by Kamaljeet at around 6 pm. Since I was attending a cremation ceremony at that time, I expressed my inability to see him. At around 7 pm, the DIG called up again and in a threatening tone asked me to immediately come to the hotel,” said the MLA. “Hun tun MLA ban gaya. Chup chaap aaja tainu dasdan main. Nahi te tainu mera pata hai (You have become an MLA now. Come here without making any fuss, I tell you. Otherwise, you know me quite well),” the MLA quoted DIG as saying.
Rinku said at that point of time, he told the DIG to mind his language but the latter did not stop there and went on to say that ignoring a police officer can cost him (MLA) dear. The MLA claimed that the police officer was apparently drunk when he threatened him.
Rinku, thereafter, took up the matter with chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh, the state chief secretary and director general of police (DGP). “The CM Saab even called me up to know exactly what happened, but no action could be taken as he was in mourning after the death of his mother,” said the MLA.
Sources told Hindustan Times that before initiating any action, the CM asked the DGP to look into the matter. Though top police officials are not willing to come on record on the issue, sources said an internal probe ordered by the DGP found the DIG guilty of threatening the MLA.
Notably, Yurinder served as commissioner of police, Jalandhar, and SSP, Jalandhar (rural), when Rinku was a Congress councillor in Jalandhar municipal corporation (MC).
“The hotelier and the DIG are good friends and the police officer was threatening the MLA not to intervene in the case,” said a police official. “If a DIG was summoning a ruling party MLA in this manner, imagine how these police officers would be treating the common man,” said an MLA.
