New Delhi/Chandigarh, December 5
Senior Shiromani Akali Dal leader and Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal today appealed to the Election Commission of India to order the suspension of Patiala SSP Varun Sharma besides launching disciplinary action against him and all other police officers involved in acting upon illegal directions to obstruct nominations and intimidate voters as well as opposition candidates in the ongoing Block Samiti and Zila Parishad elections in Punjab.
The Bathinda MP, who submitted a memorandum to the ECI here, urging for deployment of para military forces in the State to conduct the elections and constitution of a time bound high level enquiry under the ECI to authenticate the audio recording as well as fix responsibility for mass scale violence, rigging and subversion of the democratic process in the State. Badal also called for taking stern action against the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) including cancellation of their registration as a political party.
Giving details of the viral conference call which was exposed by SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal and in which the Patiala SSP was heard giving directions to district police officers to detain opposition candidates illegally in plain clothes prior to their reaching government offices to file their nominations as per guidance of AAP legislators, Badal said “this points to not only rogue behaviour by SSP Varun Sharma but also a party-directed, institutionalised strategy of AAP to subvert the administration’s electoral neutrality.
The Bathinda MP said there was no splicing or editing in the viral conference call and voices corresponded to identified officers and important functionaries. She said moreover the actual pattern of nomination-time obstructions, detention of opposition workers and selective police protection to AAP supporters, as reported in Patiala and adjoining areas, further strengthened the conference call’s authenticity.
Asserting that the conference call should be subjected to a forensic examination, Badal said “This is necessary in the wake of AAP government attempts to dismiss the viral audio as “inauthentic” and “fabricated”. Badal informed the Commission that earlier also in the case of the Tarn Taran bypoll the ECI had ordered the suspension of then SSP Dr Ravjot Kaur Grewal for partisan conduct and misuse of police machinery for electoral ends.
