M A I N   N E W S

Daler Mehndi case: 4 show photos of foreign trip
Jangveer Singh
Tribune News Service

Patiala, October 12
Four persons today presented photographs and documentary evidence implicating Shamsher Mehndi in the human trafficking case even as sources said the Patiala police was set to raid the house of Daler’s younger brother Mika in Delhi tonight.

All the four youngsters, who belong to Gurdaspur district, showed TNS photographs clicked by them as part of Shamsher’s “artiste troupe” in Thailand early this year. The youngsters also presented various applications written by Shamsher Mehndi to French and Polish embassies in which he has included the names of Daler’s wife and children as members of the group of artistes going on a “summer holiday”.

One of the youngsters Maninder Singh said a friend of theirs’ was a Punjab Armed Police (PAP) constable who had served with Daler Mehndi. He said when the constable had asked Daler if some of his friends could immigrate abroad in some manner, the pop star had asked him to contact Shamsher. Maninder said Shamsher told eight of them that he would apply for their visa in the Germany embassy and took Rs 4.5 lakh from them for this purpose.

Maninder, Sukhwinder Singh, Ramanpreet Singh and Dalbir Singh, all of Gurdaspur district, said instead of taking them to Germany, Shamsher took them to Thailand. They said they had to come back from there when they could not proceed further despite promises from Shamsher that he would get them visa for Zurich from Thailand. They said when they came back to Delhi they were put up at the office of Shamsher for one night and that it was from there that they had lifted some documents.

The men said the entire affair was a meticulously planned operation with Shamsher issuing them cards as various heads of the Big M Entertainers so that their claim for visa could be credible. Besides this in an application to the French embassy by Shamsher he referred himself to as Ustad Shamsher Mehndi and said he was taking various artistes on a trip to Europe for the summer holidays. This list included the names of Daler’s wife Daljit Kaur, his son Gurdeep Singh, and daughters Ajit Kaur and Prabhjot Kaur besides Shamsher’s wife and child.

Maninder said this was not all. He said some of the men were again taken to Thailand on the promise that they would be able to get a visa for another country from there. Maninder said he had to stay there for more than four months and was given food once a day and could not return because a manager of Shamsher had kept his passport with him. He said though he had come home after being able to retrieve his passport another friend of his — Sukhwinder Singh had still not come back from Thailand.

Meanwhile Senior Superintendent of Police Paramraj Singh Umranangal said he had received an application from some persons who were claiming that they had been duped by Shamsher Mehndi. He said this application would be investigated.