SGPC legal team meets pro-Khalistan youths in Dibrugarh jail, to take up case

Guwahati, April 11 A group of lawyers from the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), who met the 'Waris Punjab De' outfit members in the Central jail in Assam's Dibrugarh, have said they will contest their case in the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Eight members of the outfit have been lodged in the jail, who were apprehended during a Punjab Police crackdown on Sikh radical preacher Amritpal Singh and his associates.

The lawyers' panel that met the inmates on Monday included SGPC member and advocate Bhagwant Singh Sialka, counsel Mandeep Singh Sidhu, who is a brother of late Deep Sidhu, founder of Waris Punjab De, and advocate Rohit Sharma.

Advocate Sialka said that the SGPC legal team had received support in submitting an application to the authority of the Dibrugarh jail to meet the eight NSA detainees from the District Legal Services Authority, the Dibrugarh Bar Association, and local advocates.

Advocate Mandeep Singh said, "Under the NSA, all detainees have access to their fundamental right as prisoners. They are housed collectively and have access to publications and television in the prison. They have a positive attitude."

"They don't have enough clothes. Otherwise, they have the other facilities other prisoners should have," according to Bhagwant Singh Sialka.