AMRITSAR, Punjab, India, Nov. 1, Reuter: Police said on Sunday that they had shot dead a leading Sikh freedom fighter in the North Indian state of Punjab, where 12 people were killed in a spote of weekend attacks
A police patrol killed Kuldip Singh Mucchal near Tarn Taran town late on Saturday. Three of his companions escaped.
Singh, 34, has allegedly been implicated by the police in several cases of violence including the massacre of 29 bus passengers at Khuda this year, police said.
Singh styled himself a Lieutenant General of the Khalistan Liberation Force, one of several groups fighting for a separate Sikh state in Punjab.
Police have shot dead four members of the group in the past week including Baljit Singh and Jasbir Singh of New Model Town, Lud hiana who was actually arrested much earlier.
Police killed another five freedom fighters in three separate incidents over the weekend.
Freedom fighters, on the other hand, ambushed a paramilitary police patrol near Kapurthala late ‘on Saturday, killing two police ‘men and wounding three.
Meanwhile, gunmen killed four other people in separate attacks in the state, police said.
The killings brought the unofficial toll in the ongoing violence to 1,061 so far this year compared with an official 640 in 1986.
Singh was involved in the Sikh ‘movement for justice and freedom in Punjab in the early 1980s.
He was a friend of Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale who was killed while defending the sanctity of the Golden Temple in June 1984 when the Indian Army attacked the temple in an unprecedented action against its own people and then holiest religions shrine.
Article extracted from this publication >> November 6, 1987
