‘Police ignored request for security’

The family of Shahdara MLA of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Jitender Singh Shunty who survived the early Wednesday morning armed attack, have accused the Delhi police of being non-serious to threats to his life.

The family of Shahdara MLA of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Jitender Singh Shunty who survived the early Wednesday morning armed attack, have accused the Delhi police of being non-serious to threats to his life.

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They alleged that despite making five back-to-back requests and a series of meetings with Delhi police top brass, including the police commissioner, Shunty was not provided any security cover.

According to Shunty’s family, Wednesday’s attack was not the maiden attempt to kill the BJP MLA. They claimed there have been at least two more life threatening attacks on the MLA and several threatening calls had been made to his mobile phone in the past seven years.

Manish Singh, the BJP MLA’s son, claimed that the first attack on his father took place before the MCD election results were announced in April 2007. Shunty had participated in the election as an Independent candidate and had won as the corporator from Jhilmil seat.

According to the MLA, he received several threatening calls during the 2013 Delhi assembly elections after which he filed a complaint. “The police identified the caller and told me that he was not a criminal but a mentally unstable man. I trusted their (police) claims and decided to ignore the issue. I believed that the previous two attacks were due to political rivalry,” Shunty added.

On being asked about the response of the Delhi police to his requests for security, Shunty claimed that no progress had been made. “I even met Delhi Police Commissioner BS Bassi a couple of days ago and sought security. But nothing changed,” said Shunty.

When HT contacted some senior Delhi police officers for their comment on the security issue, they claimed that there was no serious threat to Shunty’s life. “We receive requests for security from people everyday. But it is not feasible to provide security to everybody. There is a security review committee (SRC) in Delhi police which looks into such requests. The security assessment of the applicant is done by the special cell of Delhi police. The final decision on providing security cover is taken on the basis of their assessment report,” said a senior police officer adding Shunty has got two commandos from the Punjab Police for his security.