Sidhu Moosewala killing: Magisterial probe initiated into encounter

Tribune News Service

PK Jaiswar

Amritsar, July 22

Two days after the police encounter of two gangsters involved in broad daylight killing of Shubhdeep Singh, aka Sidhu Moosewala, a magisterial probe started here on Friday.

The Ajnala Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM), Amanpreet Singh, today visited the encounter spot along with senior police officials and recreated the scene there in order to probe the entire incident.

The SDM remained at the spot for over two hours and asked cops about the entire timeline of the event and how it unfolded. He also saw open fields around the building where the duo were hiding and the positions of the police teams, who were retaliating their firing. He also questioned villagers living in the vicinity of the crime scene.

On the orders of the Punjab DGP, Gaurav Yadav, a three-member special investigating team (SIT) has also been constituted for probing the encounter.

The SIT would be headed by the Superintendent of Police, Prithipal Singh. The DSP, Sanjiv Kumar, and the Gharinda police station SHO, Gurwinder Singh, would be its other two members.

The anti-gangster task force (AGTF), along with the Mansa and the city police, gunned down Jagroop Singh Rupa of Tarn Taran and Manpreet Singh, alias Mannu Kusa, of Moga at Hoshiarnagar village in Attari sub-division here on Wednesday. They had been hiding in a vacant house belonging to Balwinder Singh Billa of Bhakna Kalan village.

During over four hour long operation, around 400 cops of the AGTF, the Mansa, the Amritsar city as well as the rural police were deployed, who cordoned the entire area leaving no space for the two gangsters to escape. The gangsters were repeatedly asked by cops to surrender, but instead they continued firing at the police party.

The AGTF and the Mansa police was chasing the duo since the murder of Sidhu Moosewala. During the chase, they came to know that the two gangsters were hiding in a house owned by Billa. Billa’s family told the police that they used to store fodder for milch animals in the house. Nobody used to stay at the house, the family said.

The Deputy Commissioner of Police (Investigation), Amritsar, Mukhwinder Singh Bullar, said the people told that a car had dropped the two gangsters at the spot. So, police teams were looking for the suspected car, he said.

Meanwhile, forensic teams continued their search in the area for the third consecutive day on Friday.

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