Trouble In Store For Punjab Police

[just_someone]

Fake Encounters

Trouble in store for erring cops

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 25

The fresh investigations into fake encounters that began soon after three militants resurfaced long after the police claimed to have eliminated them is now threatening to snowball into a major issue of concern for the Punjab Police.

Several police officials, who claimed cash rewards and were awarded police medals for supposedly having “killed” these very militants could be in trouble.

Well-placed sources in the police have stated out that the ongoing probe is expected to reveal startling facts about how some unscrupulous policemen used the system to kill innocents and pass them off as militants, who in those times used to carrying a big cash reward on their heads; also, how these cops went onto claiming promotions on the basis of fake killings, all this while misleading the state.

Sources said the identity of the people who were ‘bumped-off’ to show the elimination of Gurnam Singh Bandala, Gurcharan Singh Giani (a younger brother of Khalistan Commando Force supremo Surjit Singh Painta) and Jaspal Singh Bhatti, had been established.

It was after these three militants resurfaced early this year that a probe was ordered into the fake killings. Now, the reports filtering out indicate that the police records collected by the investigating officers show that the FIRs and the postmortem reports do exist, but these relate to the deaths of other people and not these militants.

Police teams would now be sent to Madhya Pradesh where one such fake encounter took place.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2007/20070726/punjab1.htm#8