15 Punjab Congress MLAs booked for assault on policeman

15 Congress MLAs were today booked on charges of assaulting a public servant inside Punjab Assembly premises during an alleged police raid on legislature party office.
Speaker Charanjit Singh Atwal had informed the House that the Chandigarh Police had agreed to register a criminal case against six Congress MLAs, who were allegedly involved in an assault on a police constable Jaipal Singh outside the Congress office in the Assembly premises yesterday.
While six of the MLAs were named in the FIR, rest were unnamed.
The six Congress MLAs, who were booked by name after a complaint by Sukhwant Singh Gill, commandant, Police Armed Police Mohali, are Gurkirat Singh Kotli, Kuljit Singh Nagra, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, Jagmohan Singh Kang, Rana Gurjit Singh and Balbir Singh Sidhu.

The complaint was forwarded by the Assembly secretary to the Chandigarh Police for registration of an FIR.
The Speaker had summoned the Chandigarh Police IG R P Upadhayay to his chamber, where following a discussion he agreed to register an FIR, Atwal said.

Meanwhile, Head Constable Jaipal Singh, who was allegedly assaulted by the MLAs after police personnel "raided" the CLP office in the Assembly complex yesterday was got medically examined.
"He is suffering from two minor injuries," DSP Ashish Kapoor said.
SSP R S Ghuman confirmed that the police had booked the MLAs under various sections of the IPC for assaulting a public servant.

In what is being clearly seen as a counter-measure, Punjab Congress today shot off a letter to the office of Chandigarh Inspector General of Police seeking registration of a case against Punjab police personnel who allegedly forcibly entered the Congress office on Wednesday, "damaged the office and caused hurt to some of its party MLAs".
The letter, signed by CLP office secretary AC Kaushik, claims that at about 10 am on Wednesday, while the proceedings of the Assembly were on, Congress MLAs Tripat Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Hardial Singh Kamboj and a few others were sitting and were preparing the notes for participating in the debate on Governor's address.

"Around 50 Punjab police officials forcibly entered the office and started tearing the notes of the sitting MLAs while asking Kaushik himself about the Dalit girl, the victim of police thrashing in Taran Taran," the letter said.