CHANDIGARH: Three days after the attack on Punjab Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) vice-president Brig Jagdish Gagneja (retd), the Centre has deployed 15 companies of paramilitary forces in 11 districts of Punjab on Tuesday.
Punjab Police are looking into the possibility of a terror angle behind the attack.
Brig Gagneja, who was shot at by unidentified men on a bike, is battling for life at a Ludhiana hospital. Two doctors from AIIMS Delhi, including Dr Subodh Kumar and Dr Kapil Soni, who specialize in anaesthesiology, have been called to Ludhiana. Nine Rapid Action Force (RAF) companies and six from the Border Security Force (BSF) have been sent by the Centre amid fears of similar attacks being planned in the state.
Two RAF companies each have been deployed at Jalandhar, Amritsar and Ludhiana and one each in Hoshiarpur and Ferozepur. BSF companies have been stationed at Phagwara and Gurdaspur.
These places include assembly constituencies represented by the saffron party as well as RSS shakhas.
Punjab Police, however, have made no headway in the probe, two days after two Sikh men, their faces cove red, emerged as suspects following the obtaining of CCTV footage from an electronics shop near the site of the attack on Gagneja. There is one frame where both suspects are visible.
“We have sent the digital video recorder to the Gujarat Forensic Sciences University as the frame was quite grainy. The report will help us establish the identity,“ said a senior Punjab cop.
A note prepared by Punjab Police wing barely 24 hours before Gagneja was shot at said, “Three men are planning to target persons who were involved in desecration of Guru Granth Sahib and women.“
These men were arrested by Hoshiarpur cops in a joint operation with the Intelligence Bureau and state intelligence on August 5.
“They were actively involved in the Khalistan movement,“ the note said.
Punjab Police are trying to find out if there is any link between these men and Gagneja's attackers.
Rohan Dua is an Assistant Editor with Times of India. As an itine...
Read MoreRohan Dua is an Assistant Editor with Times of India. As an itinerant reporter, he has walked a marathon from rustic farms to idyllic terrains across Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh to report extensively on the filial politics, village triumphs and palace intrigues. He likes to sneak into, snoop and sniff out offices for investigative scoops, some of which led to breakthrough probes in the Railgate, Applegate, AW chopper scam, IPL fixing and drug scam. His stories nailed Pakistan's involvement with damning evidence in two Punjab terror attacks at Pathankot and Gurdaspur.
Read Less