BOMBAY: Indian police claimed it arrested Lal Singh alias Manjit Singh from near Dadar railway station recently the police issued a claborates version of how the man was overpowered by two policemen of India. They also talked of premature leakage of the story to pre-empt a bigger catch of arms from certain dealers. The police claimed that the man was none else than the suspect who had planted a bomb on an Air India plane, Kanishka, which crashed in 1985 killing 329 persons. The police claimed that Lal Singh came by Dadar-Amritsar Express from Amritsar and had eluded intelligence men posed at the railway station. It was only when he tried to hire a taxi near Dadar railway station that sub-inspector S. B Jadka along with inspector N. Gavi quietly surrounded him and whisked him away. The Indian authorities further said that the man was about to consume a cyanide pill but his attempt was thwarted by the police.
The Indian police sought to link the arrested man with the Kanishka episode as well as an attack on a Haryana minister in the U.S.A. He later shifted to Lahore, according to India. He was said to be a link between Sikh militants and the
Kashmiri militants Sections of the Canadian media digested the Indian claim without a pinch of salt and without any credible investigation linked the man with the Sikh movement and the Kanishka episode.
No Canadian intelligence man cared to get in touch with the man arrested by the Bombay police to know the position first hand. There was also no hint from the Canadian authorities that they were interested in taking up the Kanishka investigation again in view of the media.
Article extracted from this publication >> July 31, 1992
