Ludhiana, Punjab: Dal Khalsa activists led by its president H S Dhami and spokesperson Kanwar Pal Singh. who visited civil hospital Ludhiana today to meet Bapu Surat Singh Khalsa, who is on fast unto death since Jan 16, were not allowed to meet him by the police administration.
Even the family members of the fasting activist were not allowed to meet Bapu Surat Singh. The city police after the crackdown on his supporters on July 20 forcibly took Bapu from his house and admitted to civil hospital.
The condition of Bapu Surat Singh has deteriorated since he has stopped taking water to protest his forced detention. “We apprehend that the administration has plans to force-fed him today that’s why it has disallowed family members and others to meet him”.
“We expressed our desire to meet the ailing Bapu Surat Singh but the senior police officer present over there refused us point blank”, said Dhami. Informing the media, he said the SSP told us that nobody is allowed to meet him (Bapu) and this decision has been taken at highest level.
Hence, we met family members and expressed our solidarity with them, he said and added that the government was not at all serious in addressing the crisis. Taking strong note of the police high-handedness on supporters of Bapu Surat Singh’s cause, the Dal Khalsa leaders said the attitude and behaviour of the state government and the police towards them was crystal clear: either pursue Bapu to end the fast or remain in jail. “The manner in which the police has done crackdown, conducted midnight raids on political activists shows that there was no room for dissent over here”.
The government has done nothing to resolve the crisis, contrary to it, it was hell bent to suppress the campaign for the release of detainees who have served their maximum prison term. Dal Khalsa activists demanded immediate release of all members of the Sangarsh committee.