By India Blooms News Service Apr 25, 2023
Chandigarh/IBNS: Arrested separatist leader Amritpal Singh was trying to build a new brand of the Khalitani identity in the north Indian state of Punjab, intelligence officials said as reported by media.
Intel officials said this a day after Amritpal was arrested.
Officials say Amritpal entered into Punjab with a bigger conspiracy hatched by Pakistan ISI in collusion with Khalistani elements in the UK.
The Europe and US networks of the Khalistan outfits were apparently used as a front by the Pak ISI to give it an organic face and create a false narrative to fuel separatism, said officials as quoted by The Week.
Amritpal Singh, a fugitive Khalistani leader who has been on the run since March 18, surrendered before Punjab police in Moga on Sunday.
He has been arrested by the police.
According to the police, the 29-year-old surrendered at a gurudwara in Rode village in the Moga district. He even delivered a sermon ahead of surrendering to the police.
Moga is the birthplace of Khalistani separatist and terrorist Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale.Amritpal Singh claims to be his follower and is known as Bhindranwale 2.0 among his supporters.
The radical Sikh preacher made open statements about declaring secession from India and creating Khalistan, while also threatening Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann.
He also referred to the assassinations of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Chief Minister Beant Singh by terrorists to warn the ministers and law enforcers.
Since being active in India, Amritpal Singh incited Sikh youths to engage in armed rebellion against democratically elected governments, citing discriminatory treatment as the reason, in order to achieve the ultimate goal of creating Khalistan.
Punjab Police had launched a crackdown on Amritpal Singh and members of his outfit Waris Punjab De on March 18, a month after his supporters stormed a police station in Ajnala.
In February, Amritpal Singh and his supporters, some of them brandishing swords and guns, broke through barricades and barged into the Ajnala Police Station on the outskirts of Amritsar city, and clashed with police for the release of one of his aides.
His surrender comes days after his wife Kirandeep Kaur was stopped at the Amritsar airport while she was trying to board a flight to London.