AMN / WEB DESK / PATIALA
A Punjab policeman’s hand was chopped off and six other cops were injured when a group of people allegedly attacked them at Sanaur vegetable market in Punjab’s Patiala district on Sunday, police said.
ASI Harjeet Singh, whose left hand was chopped off from the wrist, was rushed from Balbera village to the Government Medical College in Patiala and then referred to the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) in Chandigarh.
The ‘Nihangs’ then fled to Gurdwara Khichri Sahib, where, after an initial standoff, the police arrested nine, including a woman. Police had entered the gurdwara after a gunshot was heard from inside.
One of them was injured in police firing and was being taken to a hospital for treatment, said KBS Sidhu, Special Chief Secretary, Punjab, in a tweet.
They have been taken to the CIA (Crime Investigation Agency) office for interrogation.
Two of them refused to cooperate and shouted religious and anti-police slogans.
They said that they “feared no one” and were justified in their act of chopping off the hand of an on-duty ASI.
About 100 cops have been deployed to search the residential premises near the gurdwara for arms. A police team met village heads and local religious leaders and took control of the gurdwara.
Patiala IG Jatinder Aulakh said that police have recovered intoxicants and weapons from the rooms adjacent to the gurdwara—where the accused were staying.
Police recovered illegal weapons, including over a dozen sharp-edged swords, two petrol bombs and cartridges.
Aulakh said that they have also recovered over 6 kgs of ‘bhang’.
He said that police teams are searching the nearby fields in case some weapons were hidden there, just before the surrender, to deceive policemen.
Standoff at Gurdwara Khichri Sahib
Shortly after the attack, police teams, led by Patiala SSP Mandeep Singh Sidhu and supervised by the Patiala IG, reached the gurdwara and urged the ‘Nihangs’ to surrender. Police sealed the area around the gurdwara and the village with three-tier security so that no one could escape.
The ‘Nihangs’ had refused to surrender. The police also lacked an estimate of the number of armed men inside the gurdwara.