Court takes serious view of lawmaker-police officer spat

CHANDIGARH - Taking a serious view of the ongoing spat between a lawmaker and the Amritsar police chief, the Punjab and Haryana High Court Saturday said that police were free to initiate action against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator for his recent utterances.

The spat between Amritsar-North legislator Anil Joshi and district police chief Kunwar Vijay Pratap Singh has been continuing for nearly a week after the Amritsar police registered cases against supporters of the lawmaker.

Taking note of separatist utterances by the BJP legislator where he referred to Singh as “Bihari” and threatened that he (Singh) would be beaten up and sent back to Bihar, the court held that as far as the communal utterances by the legislator are concerned, the police officer could go ahead and was fully empowered to take lawful action.

The matter came up for hearing before the high court on a petition filed by an NGO, Citizen’s Voice.

Joshi had this week even threatened to go on hunger strike if the police officer was not transferred from Amritsar.

The BJP is an alliance partner with the ruling Akali Dal in Punjab.

The petition had sought that the legislator be ordered to refrain from interfering in the administration of law and order by the police officer.

Hemant Goswami, convener of Citizens’ Voice, expressed satisfaction over the court order saying that no one should interfere with the functioning of an officer.

NGOs here also moved a petition with the Punjab assembly speaker Saturday seeking that legislator Joshi’s membership in the assembly be terminated.

–Indo-Asian News Service’