E-Paper
Former MLA Zira released after HC questions detention
A day after his arrest, he was granted bail by a Zira civil court, but he remained in custody as he was stated to be detained under Sections 107 and 151 of the CrPC (preventive custody) and sent to judicial custody, which continued till Monday evening.
Hours after Punjab and Haryana high court questioned detention of former Congress MLA Kulbir Zira, he was released by Ropar jail authorities on Monday evening.
He was arrested in the wee hours on October 17 in connection with an October 12 FIR registered in Zira on the allegations of obstructing the government servants from discharging their duties.
A day after his arrest, he was granted bail by a Zira civil court, but he remained in custody as he was stated to be detained under Sections 107 and 151 of the CrPC (preventive custody) and sent to judicial custody, which continued till Monday evening.
On Monday, when the matter was taken up by the high court, it took serious note of the situation when Zira’s lawyers said he was still in custody and had not been released. They had termed his custody a case of vendetta politics and termed his detention illegal as it was beyond 24 hours in a case of preventive custody case.
The HC questioned the government lawyer how the Congress MLA had been kept in custody beyond 24 hours. At one point, the court observed that the officers involved in the case would be in “serious trouble”, if matter lingers on. When the case resumed after around 15 minutes in the evening, the government counsel told the court that the executive magistrate had passed the order for release and would be released by 7.30 pm. The high court has disposed of the plea now.
The high court had acted on his brother Prabhjit Singh Sidhu’s plea filed on October 21, terming the detention illegal.
