A day after a 35-year-old Dalit Sikh youth was brutally lynched and strung up at the farmers’ protest site at Singhu border, the police arrested a Nihang Sikh, Sarvjit Singh, in the case.
The police on Saturday said that Singh was taken into custody after he surrendered to the police on Friday night for his alleged role in the lynching.
The deceased identified as Lakhbir Singh, a Dalit Sikh from Cheema Kalan village in Tarn Taran, Punjab.
Nihang is an order of Sikh warriors, characterised by blue robes, antiquated arms such as swords and spears, and decorated turbans surmounted by steel quoits.
“One Nihang Sikh has been taken into custody. He will be produced in the court later in the day. We are probing his role in the murder. The claim of desecration of holy book at the Singhu border is yet to be verified. It is a matter of investigation,” Jashandeep Singh Randhawa, superintendent of police, (SP), Sonepat told reporters.
In many videos that emerged on Friday night, Sarvjit Singh took responsibility for killing Dalit youth alleging that he had desecrated the holy book.
In one of the videos, the Dalit man could be seen tied upside down while blood oozed from his chopped off wrist.
In another video emerged on Friday, Lakhbir Singh could be purportedly seen lying in a pool of blood, with one arm tied to a rope and his chopped off left hand next to his face, as several Nihang Sikhs stood over and questioned him about his identity.
Police who registered an FIR against unknown persons on Friday on charges of murder and common intention, had said that they had received information around 5 am on Friday that Nihangs had hanged and tied a person to a barricade and his hand was chopped off.
