Khalistan 2.0: How Amritpal's vision got this far

The Taliban-Pakistan network with Khalistani groups in UK, US, Canada, Germany, and Australia are using drug trade to improve support for Khalistani cause, the NIA said

The NIA arrest of Kulwinder Singh Khanpuria in November 2022 helped investigators trace the alleged efforts to revive the Khalistani network and Punjab's militancy.

Khanpuria is associated with the banned Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) and was arrested attempting to enter India from Thailand. He was living in Pakistan and a red corner notice (RCN) was out against him. Khanpuria is a close aide of Harwinder Singh Sandhu or Rinda, and the two were allegedly part of the May 2022 RPG attack on the Mohali police station.

The network of pro-Khalistani militant groups has been active for the last three years in Punjab with the emergence of the 30-year-old radical preacher and Waris Punjab De chief Amritpal Singh.

Read | Amritpal Singh: The preacher who stirred up trouble

Now, Singh has been declared a fugitive and is on the run from the law for the past week. Neither central agencies nor the state police has been able to capture him but he was last seen in CCTV footage in Patiala.

As Singh continues to give authorities the slip, Punjab and Haryana High Court has recently chided the state police for their 'intelligence failure' and inability to apprehend the radical preacher despite 80,000 personnel in the state.

How Amritpal Singh rose

Amritpal was living in Dubai and working as a truck driver before he came to India in 2021 for the first time during the farmer protests. He again came in 2022 when Shubhdeep Singh Sidhu or Sidhu Moosewala died.

The 30-year-old started Amrit Sanchar to keep the youth away from drugs but police claim that under the garb of de-addiction, Amritpal began the Khalsa Veer campaign to strengthen his organization by visiting villages.

However, he really started making waves when Amritpal's supporters stormed a police station in Ajnala on February 24 to secure the release of one Lovepreet Toofan - the preacher's associate.

While Amritpal and his supporters alleged that Toofan was wrongly implicated in the case, the cops felt they could not take action against Toofan and the mob because Amritpal had deliberately put the Bir of Guru Grant Sahib in a minibus during the incident, preventing police action.

There was a crackdown against the WPD on March 18 due to this incident and it was claimed that Singh might be part of anti-national activities.

However, a large number of Sikhs did not hold the same opinion, suspecting that Amritpal might already be in police custody. Subsequently, the police released videos and the route of Singh's escape which has been tracked to Haryana.

"Bhai Amritpal was only trying to wean away youths from drugs. He was protesting against wrongful arrest at Ajnala. There is tacit support for him across Punjab among youths and those outside Punjab (diaspora)," a resident of Jalandhar told The Economic Times.

After the police arrested 200 suspects, the Opposition launched an attack on the Punjab government and police force saying innocent youth were being targeted. Later, authorities clarified that only 30 people had been charged with criminal cases. The others were under preventive detention.

Khalistan 2.0

As per the NIA, Kulwinder Singh's arrest shone a light on the role of Rinda, who is originally from Tarn Taran but migrated to Maharashtra's Nanded after committing crimes in Punjab. He later crossed the Nepal border and received shelter in Pakistan because of his proximity to BKI head Wadhawa Singh Babbar.

The NIA further uncovered that the Mohali attack was planned in Pakistan but Rinda communicated with gangsters in Canada, not Punjab, so the Pakistani handlers would have deniability in the matter.

The Punjab Police investigation unearthed the involvement of Nishan Singh, a Tarn Taran resident, whose foreign handler is Lakhbir Singh Landa, a history-sheeter who currently resides in Canada. Landa arranged for the safe house, arms and ammunition for the Mohali attack, as per the police.

Before Khanpuria's arrest, the Delhi Police Special Cell managed to capture four sharpshooters of the group in September-October 2022. Among them, Harmender Singh and Sukhdev revealed that they had coordinated drone droppings of arms and ammunition, the police said.

According to authorities the supply chain of arms run by Rinda was meant to ensure the Lawrence Bishnoi gang received what they needed, alongside the Davinder Bambiha syndicate and criminals working independently.

When the case was later transferred to the NIA, the agency charge-sheeted Bishnoi, Goldy Brar, and 12 others on Friday. As per the NIA, the total number of suspects in this terrorist-gangster nexus is 26.

The NIA further said in the chargesheet that it had found another module of narco-terrorists where an individual Dharminder Singh was discovered to have links with Harmeet Singh, the head of the Pakistan-based group, the Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF), and Jasmeet Singh Hakimzada, a Dubai based drug smuggler. They were apparently running drug trafficking in Punjab.

The Taliban-Pakistan network along with Khalistani groups in the UK, US, Canada, Germany, and Australia are increasingly using drug trade to improve support for the Khalistani cause, the NIA said.

The trouble with the Punjab Police

Punjab police were at the front of battling pro-Khalistani militancy in the 1980s and in the first half of the 1990s. After 2015, there were a series of sacrilegious incidents. Police opened fire in one such circumstance, which led to the death of two Sikh protestors. A probe against the policemen was initiated.

Last month, the Punjab Police SIT filed a chargesheet in the FIRs registered in 2015 and 2018 in the firing case at Kotkapura and named then Punjab CM Prakash Singh Badal and his son Sukhbir Badal, along with then state police head Sumedh Singh Saini as among the seven key accused.

A few police officers were named as well including the Ludhiana commissioner, the deputy inspector general, and the then-Faridkot senior superintendent of police.

The inaction against Ajnala protestors might be because senior cops don't want to face action once the regime changes. Punjab police were also on the wrong side during PM Narendra Modi's security lapse amid political uncertainty there.

Recently, top Punjab police officials faced major penalties including demotion, reduction in pension, and even dismissal. Many were asked to explain why disciplinary proceedings should not be taken against them as the SC committee recommended after probing the security breach during Modi's Punjab visit on January 5, 2022.

While the crackdown on Amritpal may have lifted the morale of the police force, his arrest could give it a significant boost, people aware of the matter told ET.