BSP asks Centre to probe Vienna, Wisconsin Gurudwara shootouts

Punjab BSP President and Member of Parliament Avtar Singh Karimpuri said the Centre had conveniently ignored his suggestion made in Rajya Sabha for sending a National Investigating Agency (NIA) team to Austria for probing the Vienna shootout in which Sant Rama Nand of Dera Sach Khand Ballan was killed.

"Who had funded the attack, provided weapons to the assailants and hatched the conspiracy should have been probed," he said.

"Had the Vienna conspiracy been unravelled, the Oak Creek (Wisconsin) incident could have been averted," Karimpuri claimed.

"It is still high time for the Central government to rectify its error by sending an NIA team to probe both Vienna and Wisconsin gurdwara shootouts so that such despicable incidents do not recur," he said.

Besides the killing of Sant Rama Nand, around 30 people were wounded, nine of them seriously, as rival factions in the Sikh community clashed inside a gurdwara, in Vienna in May 2009. The killing of the Sant Rama Nand had triggered large-scale violence in Punjab.

Karimpuri alleged that the Punjab government was taking advantage of the High Court ruling for appointing a commission to enquire into the post-Vienna happenings to victimise Dalits.

He declared that the BSP will launch a statewide stir in form of district-level dharnas and rallies in September in protest against alleged growing price rise, corruption and unemployment.