Khalistani leader Amritpal Singh is on the run from the police
The arrested aides of Khalistani leader Amritpal Singh need to be kept in high-security jails outside Punjab after being charged under the stringent National Security Act, or NSA, as there is high risk of them trying a jailbreak if kept in Punjab, intelligence sources have told NDTV.
The members of "Waris Punjab De", a radical organisation started by actor and activist Deep Sidhu and now headed by Amritpal Singh, would have also radicalised other jailed criminals and joined hands with the so-called Anandpur Khalsa Fauj, or AKF, the sources said, asking not to be named.
It would have been easy for these elements to create law and order problems by mobilising support against the arrest of their members.
Sources said charges under the NSA were needed against Amritpal Singh for a wide range of reasons. Some of them are:
The Khalistani leader had plans to ruin the peaceful atmosphere in Punjab. This was seen when he kidnapped and assaulted another Sikh, Varinder Singh, and openly defied the authorities during the Ajnala incident. Several policemen were injured that day.
He had committed sacrilege with vandalism at gurdwaras in Kapurthala and Jalandhar and gave communal speeches against other faiths.
He has been using young people to take up arms and commit acts of violence with his private militia, AKF.
The defiance of the Punjab government's order not to display weapons in the open and assaulting young people at de-addiction centres who do not obey Waris Punjab De all prove they are a threat.