M A I N   N E W S

NRI struggles to clear husband’s name
Canadian woman claims she has audio-video proof | Police dismiss evidence
Varinder Singh
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 18
This is a story of Punjab’s infamous drugs case, false alibis, alleged police torture and money changing hands. Struggling to bring this all out through secret audio/video recordings is a Canada-based woman, Amarjit Kaur Basra. Her husband, Manpreet Singh Gill, is behind bars in the Nabha jail in the Anup Singh Kahlon drug case in which Jagdish Singh Bhola is a prime suspect.

Amarjit Kaur Basra

The police have dismissed all her claims, saying they will prove everything in the court. Basra has approached the Punjab Human Rights Commission, alleging massive cover-up in the drug case.

This is how Basra, a Punjabi Canadian citizen, says her journey to the hell-hole began:

March 2, 2013: Inspector Ramandip Singh (now, a DSP), inspector Avtar Singh and Inspector Sukhbir Singh along with several men claiming to be CBI officials conducted a raid on Manpreet’s house (Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar, Ludhiana). They whisked away Manpreet and the couple’s family friend, Robin Grewal.

“My husband was brutally tortured for seven days at the behest of SSP Hardiyal Singh Maan,” alleges Basra. The police officers first demanded Rs 50 lakh, which was hiked to Rs 1 crore during Manpreet’s illegal police custody, alleges Basra.

SSP Hardial Singh Maan says the allegations are “meant to scuttle the ongoing trial in the case”.

“They (Manpreet Gill and family) are known smugglers in North America. The Canadian authorities have given us enough information about them, which we don’t want to divulge as the trial is on. The investigation and the resultant recoveries are fool-proof in this case. We will prove everything in the court,” SSP Maan told The Tribune.

Basra said Manpreet was shown to have been arrested while driving a vehicle near a police naka in Mandi Gobindgarh on the morning of March 8 last year. “The fact is he, along with his friend Robin Grewal, was picked up from our Ludhiana house on March 2. This is clearly indicated by the location of police officials involved in the operation in their call records and photographs,” she said.

Inspector Dalbir Singh Grewal “admits” in a CD that Inspector Ramandip (currently DSP) had picked up Manpreet from his home. Strangely, Manpreet does not know driving and apparently didn’t possess any driving licence either in India or Canada. The call details (as collected by Basra) of DSP Devinder Singh Brar showed his location in Patiala till 3 pm on March 8, 2013 and in Fatehgarh Sahib later in the day.

“At no point his presence was indicated at Mandi Gobindgarh where Mapreet’s arrest took place the same day,” Basra alleged.

She claims she has the video and audio recordings, where police officers including, the Investigation Officer (IO) of the case, Inspector Dalbir Singh Grewal, and Inspector Devinder Singh are shown expressing full sympathy with Manpreet’s family.

“Maan Sahib (SSP Hardial Maan) nu saari gall da pata hai…. (SSP Maan knows everything). Main IO haan. Koi gall nahi main aapni naukri vi save karni hai te usdi madad vi karanga jinne joge haige aan, (I am the IO. I will help as much as I can)” Inspector Grewal purportedly tells a family member in a video clip.

Inspector Devinder Singh, the then SHO, Women Cell, Fatehgarh Sahib, allegedly accepted in a video clip that third degree torture methods were used by the Punjab Police to extract some confession from Manpreet. “The family should thank God for he is alive,” the clip shows him as saying.

“To yank out information from criminals, we have to take them into confidence by speaking so many things to them. The same I did with them (Manpreet Gill’s family). It is a different matter that they have made a recording. But the audio is not clear,” Inspector Grewal told The Tribune.

Manpreet’s friend Robin Grewal was let off and dropped at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport by the police from where he boarded a flight to Canada on March 6.

Basra alleged she and her two minor kids were held “captive” in their house by five police officers, including, a woman in plainclothes, for two days and “were not allowed to even go to the washroom”.

She alleged Manpreet was allowed only to make calls to his brother-in-law Bobby Basra, based in Vancouver, to arrange Rs 1 crore.

Basra said: “On March 7, a team led by IO Dalbir Singh Grewal along with Manpreet went to Delhi to collect the first installment of Rs 50 lakh arranged by the family, from Mukarba Chowk. The next day, the same team drove down to Ludhiana and collected the remaining Rs 50 lakhs from near the Fuara Chowk in Ludhiana”.

Basra alleged Manpreet was promised he would be released after paying up Rs 1 crore. Manpreet was presented before SSP Hardial Singh Maan on March 8 in his office by police officers who, asked him to express his gratitude to Maan. “But when Manpreet expressed his inability to arrange more amount, he was shown arrested from a naka in Mandi Gobindgarh on the morning of March 8 along with one of his relatives, Gabbar. Heroin and synthetic drug powder weighing 1kg was planted on them,” alleged Basra.

SSP Hardial Singh Maan rubbished these claims, saying the recovery made from Manpreet was “genuine”. “The amount of Rs 1 crore recovered from Manpreet was earned by him from the drug trade. There is not even an iota of truth in the extortion story,” said Maan. About the call details records, Inspector Dalbir Singh Grewal said: “We have been going to various places…we might have gone to Delhi during that period. But this doesn’t mean that allegations of extortion are true.”