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Talks fail, morcha’s August 15 march to Chandigarh on
At a meeting with police, Qaumi Insaaf Morcha seeks specific route to take out march, but Chandigarh Police make it clear they will not be allowed entry in the city
Two days after the Qaumi Insaaf Morcha announced to march towards Chandigarh on August 15 as part of their ongoing protest at Mohali’s YPS Chowk, Chandigarh Police, along with their Punjab counterparts, on Wednesday held a meeting with the protest organisers.
However, police’s efforts to stop the march failed, with the organisers deciding to continue with it, even as Chandigarh Police made it clear that they will not be allowed entry in the city.
The morcha’s announcement came a week after the Punjab and Haryana high court issued a strict warning to the Punjab and Chandigarh police to remove protesters from YPS Chowk.
Deferring the hearing for August 17, the high court on August 2 had stated that it will not hesitate in issuing directions to remove the protesters by use of force.
Since January 7, Sikh activists under the banner of Qaumi Insaaf Morcha have been protesting at YPS Chowk, seeking release of Sikh prisoners lodged in different jails despite completion of their jail sentence, bringing vehicle movement on the major Chandigarh-Mohali route to a complete halt.
During the meeting at the Chandigarh Police headquarters in Sector 9 on Wednesday, police officials from Punjab and Chandigarh asked the morcha organisers to call off the August 15 protest march and vacate the protest site at YPS Chowk at the earliest.
Praveer Ranjan, director general of police (DGP), Chandigarh, chaired the meeting with four representatives of the morcha, in the presence of senior police and administrative officers, including Punjab ADGP (Law and Order) Arpit Shukla; Punjab IGP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar and Chandigarh deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh.
The morcha’s representatives included Gurcharan Singh, foster father of Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) chief Jagtar Singh Hawara, who was convicted of assassinating former Punjab CM Beant Singh, and advocates Gursharan Singh, Amar Singh Chahal and Dilsher Singh Jandiala.
“We have asked them to vacate the protest site at the earliest and remove the road blockade to restore normalcy for the general public. Moreover, we won’t allow them to enter Chandigarh on August 15,” said Kanwardeep Kaur, senior superintendent of police (SSP), Chandigarh.
Jandiala, refusing to cancel the August 15 march, said, “We held a road march on January 26 in Mohali, where over a lakh people protested peacefully. We want to take out a peaceful road march in Chandigarh this time and thus sought a specific route from the Chandigarh Police during the meeting, but they denied our request. There is no way that we will cancel the road procession as our intention is to peacefully register our protest.”
Jandiala added that police had asked them to shift their protest venue to the open space next to the protest site and remove the road blockade.
“Before this meeting, Punjab Police had offered us a protest site in Chappar Chiri few days back, but we refused that offer as the Punjab government has been making false promises for the past seven months. We also want to go back home and thus they should fulfil our demands. We will file our reply in court regarding clearing the protest site,” Jandiala added.
On February 8, protesters had clashed with police forces at the Sector 52/53 dividing road after being stopped from marching towards Chandigarh, leaving at least 33 cops injured.
