NEW DELHI India: Gunmen shot six policemen dead at a courthouse in Punjab state and freed three prisoners who were accused of killing a Hindu editor, authorities said

District Magistrate S.C. Aggarwal said that four people, including a lawyer, were wounded in the attack at the District Court complex in Jullundur, a major industrial city in central Punjab,

At least three attackers opened fire with automatic weapons as police were leading four defendants into the compound, Aggarwal said in a telephone interview. He said the assailants escaped in a police-style jeep with three of the prisoners and with three rifles taken from the slain police,

It was not clear how the fourth prisoner remained in custody.

Accounts of the attack differed.

Agearwal said the gunmen were positioned in a lane outside the courtyard and fired over the 41/2foot compound wall.

But local correspondents and witnesses said the gunmen were inside the compound and opened fire at close range when police led the prisoners to a toilet. Four officials were killed near the toilet and two others were shot dead at the courtyard gate as the attackers fled, they said.

The prisoners were to appear in court for their trial on charges of slaying Ramesh Chander, a leading Hindu newspaper editor, in. Jullundur in May 1984. Chander’s father, editor Lala Jagat Narain, ‘was killed in a violent attack in 1981.

The three escapees, all in handcuffs, were identified as Gurinder Singh, Sukhdev Singh and Swaranjit Singh. They are not related.

Punjab Police Chief Julius F. Rebeiro went to Jullundur to head the investigation.

District Police Chief Baljit Singh Sandhu told reporters the assailants fired at least 50 rounds from ‘two submachine guns and a pistol.

He said the attackers were thought to be part of the same group that shot death eight people on March 29 in three villages of Jullundur district. A jeep was also used in that attack.

Punjab police, meanwhile, said they arrested three Sikhs in connection with the slaying of three people in Khanna town, south of Jullundar, on Friday night. The victims, all Hindus, were killed when gunmen fired indiscriminately at a crowded market place.

Article extracted from this publication >> April 11, 1986