CHANDIGARH: The two accused in the Beant Singh murder case, Gurmeet Singh and Lakhwinder Singh, who are currently in the CBI custody, have denied their involvement in the bomb blast while speaking to their counsel, it was claimed in a press conference here, last week. The counsel, D.S. Rajput, and N.S. Minhas, who mot the accused in the custody claimed that although physically both appeared to be unharmed, they seem to have been tortured mentally, The lawyers were allowed to meet the accused on the directions of the Chief Judicial Magistrale, Shekhar Dhawan. The first one to be allowed was D.S. Rajput, who met Gurmeet Singh for 10 minutes in the office of the Superintendent of Police, R.K. Pachmanda, in the presence of a CBI official who stood at a distance he said that during the course of conversation, Gurmeet claimed that he had never met Lakhwinder earlier. While admitting that the suspected ‘human bomb’ Dilawar Singh, was his childhood friend, Gurmeet said that he had not met him for the past several years.
When asked about the intelligence agencies’ claim regarding recover of RDX from his room, Gurmeet told his counsel that no such material was lying in his room, Rajput further alleged that the accused apprehended threat to his life. He claimed that Gurmeet Singh was being pressured to give a confessional statement and added that till date he had not succumbed to the pressures, during the remand, he was neither allowed to meet any member of his family nor given any newspapers or magazines. An almost similar statement was given by the other accused, Lakhwinder Singh, to his counsc! N.S. Mithas who met him in the same room for 10 minutes, the accused said that he was caught by the police near “Chandigarh Club, behind the Civil Secretariat September 4: The counsel claimed that both the accused also alleged that they had been maltreated by the CBI and intelligence agencies. ‘The lawyers also distributed copies of a threatening letter written by an unknown “organization,” Indian Patriotic Front, which was delivered at the address of the court of the CIM. The letter had names of Amar Singh Chahal and Bhupinder Singh, who along with Ashok Chauhan are members of the defence committee constituted to fight the case. To a question, the lawyers said that they had not complained to the police about the threatening letter, Meanwhile, the accused will be produced in CJM’s court later when their police remand comes to an end.
Article extracted from this publication >> September 22, 1995
