Mohali: A Mohali court on Tuesday issued a notice to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the state of Punjab on an application filed by Congress leader Sukhpal Singh Khaira, 56, for allowing him to submit his nomination papers for the February 20 Punjab assembly polls before the returning officer. The next date of hearing has been fixed for January 27.
Khaira, who is lodged in the Patiala jail in a money laundering case, has been declared the Congress candidate from the Bholath assembly seat in Kapurthala district. The Election commission has fixed February 1 as the last date for filing of nomination papers in Punjab.
Last week, the ED filed a chargesheet against Khaira for allegedly laundering money in the 2017 Fazilka drug smuggling racket.
Khaira was arrested by the central agency on November 11 for his links with drug smugglers and forgers making fake passports. At the time of the arrest, Khaira denied any wrongdoing and said he was being targeted by central agencies as he has been vocal against the Centre’s three new farm laws (since repealed).
Khaira won the assembly election in 2017 from Bholath in Kapurthala district on an Aam Aadmi Party ticket. However, in January 2019, he quit the party and formed the Punjab Ekta Party (PEP), which he merged with the Congress in June 2021.
Khaira came under ED’s scanner in January 2021 in two matters -- the first pertaining to a cross-border drugs smuggling network unearthed in Fazilka in 2015 in which 1.8 kg of heroin, 24 gold biscuits, two weapons, 26 live cartridges and two Pakistani SIM cards were seized by the Jalalabad police; and a fake passport racket being run in Delhi.
{{/usCountry}}Khaira came under ED’s scanner in January 2021 in two matters -- the first pertaining to a cross-border drugs smuggling network unearthed in Fazilka in 2015 in which 1.8 kg of heroin, 24 gold biscuits, two weapons, 26 live cartridges and two Pakistani SIM cards were seized by the Jalalabad police; and a fake passport racket being run in Delhi.
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