Nabha Jailbreak: Escaped prisoners were a prize catch

November 27, 2016

Chandigarh, Nov 27: The Punjab Police and security agencies are investigating the recent activities of the five prisoners who escaped from the maximum security Nabha Jailpremises on Sunday following a well-planned attack by unidentified armed men.

nabhaPolice sources said CCTV footage of the jail, call records of jail officials and others and posts on social media sites were being studied to know the involvement of people in the sensational jailbreak.

Of the prisoners who escaped, Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF) chief Harminder Singh Mintoo was arrested in November 2014 as he returned to India from Thailand after being deported from there.

He was nabbed from the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport in New Delhi along with an aide after security and intelligence agencies tracked him.

Mintoo's aide Gurpreet Singh, also deported from Thailand, was also arrested.

Mintoo is wanted in several terror cases in Punjab. Police had claimed that Mintoo was planning terrorist strikes in the region.

"The KLF chief was wanted in 10 terrorist offences and his key aide Gurpreet Singh had been tasked to execute a conspiracy of assassinating Hindu leaders in 2013 which was foiled by Punjab Police," Punjab Additional Director General of Police (Intelligence) Hardeep Singh Dhillon had said then.

Punjab Police traced and located them in Thailand in co-ordination with central agencies. On November 7, they were brought from Thailand to New Delhi in co-ordination with Thai authorities and arrested.

Two Punjab police officers camped in Thailand for three weeks while tracking the terrorists there.

"It was established that Harminder Singh was using a fake Malaysian passport issued in the name of Gurdeep Singh (Passport A-22967012 issued in Ipoh, Malaysia) and a fake Malaysian ID Card No. 610320086949," ADG Dhillon said.

Mintoo was trying to revive and strengthen the KLF with foreign-based supporters. He visited Pakistan and later travelled to Italy, Belgium, Germany, France and other European countries for 11 months (June 2013 to May 2014) before coming to Southeast Asia.

The Punjab Police came to know about the conspiracy to eliminate Hindu leaders after sleeper cells were busted by the police in 2013-14.

Mintoo had close contact with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) officers.

Another terrorist, Kashmir Singh Galwadi, who was involved in an attack on a Punjab Hindu leader in Gurdaspur in 2013, also escaped. He was also associated with the pro-Khalistan movement.

Gangster Vicky Gonder, arrested in December last year, was suspected to be behind the murderous attack on another gangster, Sukha Kahlwan, near Jalandhar in January 2015. Kahlwan was in police protection and was being taken for a court hearing when the attack took place at Phagwara town.

Kahlwan was gunned down while the police personnel accompanying him failed to repulse the attack.

Gonder and other gangsters had been in the news for running the affairs of their gangs from inside Punjab jails and also using social media.

Gangster Gurpreet Sekhon, who also escaped on Sunday, led another gang which was involved in murder, kidnappings, extortion and highway robberies.

The other two gangsters, Neeta Deol and Vikramjit, were also involved in various crimes in Punjab and other places.

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News Network
June 10,2020

Jun 10: In a suspected case of honor killing in Telangana, a 20-year old woman was allegedly smothered to death by her parents for being in love with a man from another caste, becoming pregnant and refusing to undergo an abortion, police said on Tuesday.

The parents killed their daughter using a pillow while she was asleep in the early hours of June 7 in their house in Kalukuntla in Jogulamba-Gadwal district and sought to project it as natural death, claiming she died of a heart attack.

However, following specific information and suspicion raised by the village secretary over the death of the woman, a college student, a probe was launched and the couple arrested on charges of murder under Indian Penal Code section 302 after post-mortem, police said.

The parents decided to kill the woman, the youngest of their three daughters, a day after she was found pregnant and refused to undergo an abortion, police said.

The woman had fallen in love with the man while pursuing her degree course in Kurnool district in neighboring Andhra Pradesh and informed her parents about it after she was found pregnant during an examination by a doctor. Her parents feared that their daughter may elope with her lover and brought pressure on her to go for abortion.

Though initially, she agreed, later she declined, following which they killed her and told everyone that their daughter died of heart attack, the police official said. When a police team went to their house and insisted on a post-mortem after noticing some marks on her body indicating a struggle, the parents tried to stop it, saying there was no need.

Later, police shifted the body to a hospital where a post-mortem revealed the woman was "throttled to death". Her parents during interrogation confessed to killing their daughter, the official said, adding they were arrested.

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News Network
February 19,2020

Bengaluru, Feb 19: Bengaluru City Crime Branch (CCB) on Wednesday raided a spa in Koramangala area and rescued six girls.

The owner of the spa is absconding and the manager has been arrested.

Further details are awaited.

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Agencies
January 6,2020

New Delhi, Jan 6: A blind student who is pursuing research in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) was also attacked by the mob that perpetrated violence in the University yesterday.

"I thought that the mob which came yesterday would disperse after raising a few slogans but they indulged in violence. They were targeting ABVP students. They beat me with sticks and rods. When I went to the AIIMS Trauma Centre, I came to know that there are many other injured students there," Surya Prakash, the blind student pursuing research in the University told ANI.

"I talked to my family members. They are really worried about the situation here. I qualified in the National Eligibility Test (NET) last year but I want to study and hence I am continuing research in JNU. How can we do anything in this atmosphere of fear? I am receiving calls from anonymous numbers threatening me not to come in front of the media. They are saying that as I am blind, I would become the face of this case," he added.

Another PhD student, Santosh Bhagat recounted his experience.

"In the evening at around 7 pm, many masked men entered the hostel. They had rods and sticks in their hands. We tried to go out but the attackers had entered the premises by then. I locked my room from inside but the attackers broke the door and entered my room and attacked me. They pushed me from the first floor and I fell down and sustained an injury. Later, I took shelter at one of the Professor's flat. Later, I was taken to the AIIMS Trauma Cantre," Bhagat said.

On Sunday evening, more than 30 students of the university, including JNUSU President Aishe Ghosh, were injured and were taken to the AIIMS Trauma Centre after a masked mob entered the JNU and attacked them and professors with sticks and rods.

The JNU administration and political leaders, cutting across political lines, condemned the attack on students and urged the police to take action against the perpetrators.

Meanwhile, the situation remained tense but peaceful outside JNU on Monday morning as the university guards maintained a strict vigil at the gate, checking I-cards of all those entering the university.

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