Chandigarh: After 36 days, Amritpal Singh has been arrested by the police on Sunday while as many as nine associates of Amritpal Singh have already been arrested and were put in the Dibrugarh Jail in Assam. According to sources, Amritpal Singh's partner, Pappalpreet Singh, was said to be the mastermind behind Amritpal activities. Similarly, Daljit Kalsi is reportedly extending financial help to Amritpal. Basant Singh and Gurmeet Singh Bhukhanwala are the gunmen of Amritpal.
According to reports, Bhagwant Singh alias Pradhanmantri Bajeke, a staunch supporter of Amritpal, handles Singh's social media accounts. Harjit Singh is the uncle of Amritpal Singh while Varinder Johal, Kulwant Dhaliwal and Gurvinder Pal Singh are the security personnel to Amritpal. Currently, all of them were locked up in the Dibrugarh Central Jail of Assam and the Punjab police and central agencies will interrogate them in the Dibrugarh Jail.
After the arrest of all the accused and all were sent to the Dibrugarh Jail, What will happen next? After the arrests were made under NSA, will there ever be brought to Punjab? Will they have a hearing in Punjab or will they be produced through video conferencing? Or the case, which will be heard in NIA court? Or will the matter go to the court concerned or a special court?
Talking about the arrest, legal expert and senior advocate of Punjab and Haryana High Court RS Bains said, "This is a method of preventive detention. That means there is no case against the accused, no evidence will be presented, no case will be registered, no trial will be held, and the accused will not be produced before a magistrate. Not only that, the government can keep the accused in jail for as long as it wants."
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"Such accused are not in any judicial custody. The only defence the government has is that the accused have not been criminalised. The only basis for keeping them in jail is that the peace and stability of the country are in danger because of them. The government can keep them in jail until the evidence against them is collected. The government can keep them in jail as long as it wants, who has been arrested under NSA," Bains said.
"The arrested people have only two options, one is to create a basis for arrest. They should get a detention order. In this case, they can give representation. A Review Board will look at that representation and one of its members is a High Court judge, which will review in three months whether the order of the NSA is correct or wrong. If that Board finds the NSA wrong then the accused will be released. If the NSA found them to be true, then they have to stay in jail for one year. However, the duration may increase and if the government wants, it can leave it earlier as well, if they don't find anything against him," he said
Bains further said, "In such a case neither the arrested persons can ask for bail nor will get punishment. The conviction will not be held. This government has a special power given to it by the Constitution, called preventive detention. This is a power in which the government has no evidence and no power to file a case against a person, but the accused can be arrested as their stay outside the jail is considered to be a danger to the country."
When the legal expert was asked about the case registered against Amritpal Singh on the charge of attacking the police of Ajnala police station, he said, "The case registered against Amritpal will proceed. Nowadays the accused are being produced in court through video conferencing. In such a case, it is possible that he can be produced in court in this matter through video conferencing."
