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Parliament winter session: Punjab cites ‘hit-list’ intel to justify denial of parole to Amritpal
Senior advocate Anupam Gupta, appearing for Punjab on Monday, produced a voluminous record along with an affidavit of additional chief secretary Alok Shekhar in support of the government decision taken in respect of the parole case of Amritpal Singh on November 24.
The Punjab government told the high court that the “gravity and enormity” of the grounds for detention — as well as the conduct of Khadoor Sahib MP and Waris Punjab De chief Amritpal Singh — led it to deny him parole to attend the winter session of the Parliament.
Senior advocate Anupam Gupta, appearing for Punjab on Monday, produced a voluminous record along with an affidavit of additional chief secretary Alok Shekhar in support of the government decision taken in respect of the parole case of Amritpal Singh on November 24.
“The gravity and enormity of the grounds of detention and the petitioner’s conduct as reflected therein necessitated his continuous and uninterrupted detention for a maximum period of twelve months. (w.e.f 23.4.2025) in the interests of the security of the state and the maintenance of public order. His application for parole has accordingly been denied,” the affidavit reads while referring to a voluminous record prepared by the state in the NSA detention case of Amritpal Singh.
The government response came in response to the December 1 order of the HC asking the state to produce ‘foundational material’ based on which his parole plea was denied. The December 1 order was passed by the bench presided over by the chief justice Sheel Nagu and justice Sanjiv Berry during the hearing of the plea filed by the Sikh radical leader challenging the Punjab government’s decision to deny him parole.
The government has mainly relied on the April 2025 order, whereby an order invoking the National Security Act (NSA) was passed by the state authorities to detain him for one more year.
Grounds cited in the order are his “involvement” in activities “prejudicial to the security of the state” and further cites “grave and imminent danger to national security,” if he is released from detention. It also records apprehension that he would indulge in such activities again if released from detention.
The detention order had also recorded his “indulgence with anti-national elements, notorious and dreaded gangsters and terrorists with the intent and object to physically eliminate persons who in his perception had the potential to publicly expose his acts and misdeeds”.
The detention order had also recorded intelligence input of October 12, 2024, in which the field officers were alerted that Amritpal Singh’s sympathisers’ group had prepared as ‘hit list’ of 15 individuals, whom they want to “eliminate” in the coming days. The list included the name of one Gurpreet Singh Harinau, who was killed on October 9.
Harinau was considered a jailed MP’s close associate but had later distanced himself from him and was killed on October 9, 2024, in Faridkot. In this case, Amritpal has been nominated as an accused, the record added.
Amritpal Singh, who styled himself after slain militant preacher Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, was arrested in Moga’s Rode village on April 23, 2023, after a month-long hunt. The Khalistan sympathiser had escaped the police net in Jalandhar district on March 18, 2023, switching vehicles and changing appearances. Punjab Police launched the crackdown on him after he and his armed supporters laid siege to the police station at Ajnala on the outskirts of Amritsar on February 23, 2023, to get his aide released. Amritpal has been under detention at Dibrugarh jail in Assam since his arrest in April 2023 under the NSA Act, even as his nine other associates were brought back to Punjab in March-April this year.
The radical Sikh preacher won the Khadoor Sahib seat with 1.9 lakh votes as an Independent in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls and was administered the oath of office on July 5, 2024. Since then, he has not attended the Parliament.
NSA detention: HC notice to Punjab on Amritpal’s plea
Chandigarh: The Punjab and Haryana high court on Monday sought a response from the Punjab government on a plea from Waris Punjab De chief Amritpal Singh seeking quashing of the third successive detention order passed against him on April 17 under the National Security Act (NSA).
The petition was taken up by the bench of chief justice Sheel Nagu and justice Sanjiv Berry and has sought a response by January 27 on the plea, which claims detention is “arbitrary, void of jurisdiction and violative of constitutional safeguards under Articles 21 and 22”.
The radical Sikh leader was initially detained in April 2023 along with his nine associates. Fresh detention orders were passed against all of them in March-April 2024, but in April 2025, while his associates were brought back from Dibrugarh, a fresh order of one-year detention was passed against Amritpal Singh. He had challenged detention orders in 2023 and 2024 as well. But the petition became infructuous.
The Khadoor Sahib MP claims he has remained under preventive detention since April 2023 despite the absence of any “supporting material for continued incarceration”.
Amritpal Singh has rejected the allegations that he was associated with anti-national elements and claims such imputations are “unsupported by any material”.
The fresh detention order rests solely on an FIR registered on October 9, 2024, regarding the murder of one of his old associates, the plea said, adding that his name did not appear in the initial FIR and was nominated subsequently.
