Chandigarh: More than 28 years after one Sukhpal Singh had allegedly died in an encounter in which a militant Gurnam Singh Bandala alias Neela Tara was shown to have been killed, the Punjab police has now told the Punjab and Haryana High Court that the incident was stage-managed and the FIR in the case was registered by falsifying facts.

The high court had been earlier told by the special investigation team (SIT) that a probe had established that Sukhpal Singh was missing since July-August 1994 and that an unidentified person was killed in a police encounter in Morinda area of Ropar district.

Case was registered under TADA

It was said that a police case was registered in the context on July 29, 1994 for attempt to murder (section 307 of IPC), offences under Arms Act and the provisions of Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (prevention) Act (TADA).

The police had also claimed that a terrorist Gurnam Singh Bandala was allegedly the person killed in the police encounter. It, however, later came to light later that Bandala was alive and was arrested by police in Batala district on October 9, 1998.

Police enounter was ‘staged’

However, in its latest affidavit filed recently, the special director general of police-cum-chairperson of the SIT, Gurpreet Kaur Deo has said that during the investigation it was found out that the said police encounter in the case was stage-managed and the FIR was registered by falsifying facts.

She also said that the SIT has registered a fresh FIR in Ropar after taking opinion from Ropar district attorney, against the then superintendent of police (SP), Parmaraj Singh, deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Jaspal Singh and assistant sub-inspector (ASI) Gurdev Singh for fabrication of evidence under IPC. The SIT chief also said that the matter was currently under investigation by the SP (HQ), Ropar.

A petition in this case was filed by the victim’s wife Dalbir Kaur and his father Jagir Singh in 2013.

The matter was disposed of by Justice Vinod S Bhardwaj on Friday.