Sangat Karugi Insaaf: Outrage over government indifference in 2015 over lynching blasphemy cases in Punjab

After lynching two people in two blasphemy attempts in Amritsar and Kapurtala, Sikh groups say there would be no reaction if action had been taken in 2015 to prosecute Faridkot for blasphemy and the firing of police.
Sangat Karugi Insaaf (People Will Be Fair) – This is seen as a choir in Punjab after two men were lynched on the same day after blasphemy attempts against the Golden Temple in Amritsar and the gurdwara in Kapurthala. It highlights that the issue of profanity remains the biggest emotional issue in poll status.
Punjab police and central authorities are currently working overtime to uncover the “conspiracy” behind the contempt attempt ahead of the 2022 Punjab elections. However, as Sikhs feel guilty about the serious blasphemy incident in Faridkot in 2015, the violent reaction of the people to the incident underscores a new meaning of “immediate justice”. They did not fulfill their obligations by the government. Video footage of the
Kapurthala incident showed the crowd ignoring police trying to take the accused from the scene, and people said Sikh Sangat would interrogate the accused and bring justice. Some even complain that no action has been taken in more than 34 cases of blasphemy in the past. Sikh groups and the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) also claim that such a reaction would not have occurred had they acted on past cases.
Punjab Interior Minister Suhjinder Randhava created another SIT in the Amritsar case, but Sikh groups say they have seen many such SITs in the past. Since 2015, at least five SITs and two investigative committees have tried to define Faridkot’s blasphemy and police officer dismissal, but with little success. Family members of two young men killed by police during protests against blasphemy in 2015 say their relatives are dead, but there are still many people charged with blasphemy. Outrage at
Faridkot (Malwa region of Punjab) not taking action since 2015 is now evident across the state, especially around the recent incidents around the Sikh Panthic fortress of Majha, home to Amritsar and Kapurthala.
Parliament came to power in 2017 on promises to punish those who committed blasphemy, but failed to do so, and then Chief Minister Amarinder Singh also left the ship. Now they are hesitant to act, and so far not a single FIR has been registered with the Amritsar Lynch case, even though the case against the deceased has been raised as blasphemy. In Kapurtala, high-ranking police officials initially confirmed the FIR of four people charged with the murder of the accused, but later staged a coup d’état at a Sunday press conference saying the FIR was “still in progress”. Even the new SIT, established by the High Court earlier this year with a six-month deadline until November to review and report
cases in 2015, has not made significant progress despite recent interrogations by former CM Parkash Singh Badal, then CM attorney. Imprisoned Suhbir Singh Badal and Baba Ram Rahim of Dera Sacha Saud. A previously arrested main defendant, a supporter of Dera, was mysteriously murdered in prison in 2019.
On Sunday, Navjot Singh Sidhu, chairman of the Punjab Parliament, demanded the hanging of those who had committed blasphemy. So far, they appear to have received a signal calling for ‘immediate justice’.