PATIALA: The police raided several places Monday morning and rounded up several leaders belonging to the AkaliDal (Badal) the Akali Dal (Mann) the AISSE (Manjit) and the BKU in the district.
According to official sources among those rounded up are Sardara Singh Kohli a former minister Shingara Singh amember of the SGPC; Joginder Singh Punjrath president of the district unit of the Akali Dal(Mann);Deep Singh Dewana president of the local urban unit of the Akali Dal (Mann) Jaswinder Singh Darou a senior leader of the AISSF (Manjit) Ravinder Kaur Kid (Mann) Ajaib Singh Akali Dal Mann Mithan Singh Dera Bassi (Mann) Dhanwant Singh Dera Bassi (Mann) Amrik Singh Malikpur (Badal) Amrik Singh Lalnu Dalip Singh (Akali DalMann) Sarup Singh Sehgal (Akali Dal-Badal) Priam Singh Mohra (Budal) and Gurban Singh of the BKU.
According to highly placed government sources these leaders have been rounded up to prevent them from mobilizing people 10 boycott the proposed Punjab elections scheduled to be held on February 19.
Similar arrests are likely to be made in other districts of Punjab also according to the sources.
The other reason for such arrests being advanced by the sources is that the government wanted to discourage senior Akali leaders from organizing rallies at various places in support of their boycott decision. The six panthic organizations which have decided to boycotts the Punjab elections had recently announced a program for holding rallies against the elections.
“Meanwhile in a Press statement issued here Monday by the district unit of the Alkali Dal (Mann) it has been stated that a meeting of the six panthic organizations which support the boycott would be held at Gurdwara Dukh Niwaran here on January 30 Senior leaders of these organizations belonging to Ropar and Patiala districts are scheduled to participate in this meeting.
Article extracted from this publication >> February 7, 1992
