NRI Kidnap Case

Charge sheet against six accused filed in court
Police adds sections of robbery, wrongful confinement, forgery in NRI kidnap case

Chandigarh, June 27
The UT police today filed a charge sheet in the NRI kidnapping-for-ransom case, that was registered on April 10. The charge sheet was filed against six accused and the police added sections of robbery, wrongful confinement, receiving stolen property and forgery in the charge sheet after completing investigations.
The charge sheet was been filed in court under Sections 364-A, 341, 342, 397, 411, 468, 471, 473 and 474 of the IPC.
Navneet Singh Chatha, a Canada-based NRI, was kidnapped for a ransom of Rs 1 crore on April 10. A team of the crime branch of the UT police had rescued him following an extensive operation at Darua village in Kurukshetra.
The NRI's brother in Canada had received a ransom call, demanding Rs 1 crore. The police laid a trap and arrested the six accused who kidnapped the NRI.
The kidnappers fired shots at the police and the police had to open fire. The charge sheet was filed against Pradeep Malik, Nitin, Sanjeev Kumar, alias Soni, Sukhdev, Anil Kumar and Ajit Singh. While Pradeep fired shots at the police, Soni was the owner of the farmhouse where the victim was confined.
Of the six accused, Anil Kumar had three cases of murder registered against him and was a proclaimed offender with the Haryana Police. As per the charge sheet, the police had recovered Rs 12.5 lakh, 300 Canadian dollars, the Honda Accord car of the victim, a Swift Desire car robbed from a person in Panchkula and two mobile phones.
An investigating officer said the NRI was robbed of his purse and belongings at gunpoint in confinement, following which the police added sections of robbery with attempt-to-murder under Section 397 of the IPC.
The Swift Desire car used in the crime was stolen from Panchkula and an FIR in this regard had been registered there. The police had recovered a fake registration certificate of the car and added sections of forgery in the charge sheet.

the case Navneet Singh Chatha was kidnapped for a ransom of Rs 1 crore on April 10. A police team rescued him following an extensive operation.

Relative throws 7 of family into canal; 6 feared drowned



A police official and villagers at the crime spot

Khamano June 27
In a shocking incident, a relative allegedly pushed seven members of a family into the Bhakra canal near Thablan village at different times since yesterday to grab the money the family got after the sale of their land in Sangrur district. While six of them are feared drowned, 35-year-old Jasmin Kaur managed to save herself and brought the matter to light.
The victims have been identified as Gurmel Singh (65), his wife Paramjit Kaur, son Gurinder Singh (33), son-in law Rupinder Singh (36), and grandchildren Jaskirat Singh(4) and Simarpreet Kaur (6). The family belonged to Mukandpur village in Ludhiana district.
The accused, Khushwinder Singh, is a close relative of former police havildar Gurmel Singh. He is a resident of Suhavi village in the subdivision and runs a photocopy business at the Fatehgarh Sahib court.
In her statement to the police, Jasmin alleged: "Khushwinder had promised to send Gurmel and his family members abroad. He first brought four family members on the banks of the canal yesterday morning to please divine powers. When they sat near the canal on his directions, he pushed them into the water body.
"Last night, Khushwinder picked up the remaining members and reached the canal bridge. He pushed them into the canal and escaped at around 9 pm. I managed to swim out".
Kuldip Singh, a nephew of Gurmel, who was present at the site with other villagers, said they were looking for the bodies. Several police officials and fingerprint experts reached at the site.
SSP Mandeep Singh Sidhu said the accused had been arrested. The police had recovered the car used in the crime and Rs 36.70 lakh from his custody, he said, adding that divers had been pressed into service to locate the victims.

Bill C-31: Past wrongs and present-day injustices

Japanese Canadians being relocated to camps in the interior of British Columbia after the outbreak of World War II.

Canada is a country of contradiction. On the one hand, it has an international reputation as one of the world’s most compassionate and humanitarian countries. On the other, Canada is tainted by historical injustices committed by the Canadian government against specific groups simply because of who they were, not what they did.

That contradiction has from time to time manifested itself in this country’s treatment of immigrants, refugees and Canadians of racial minority descent, both past and present. To its credit, the Canadian government has apologized and redressed many of these past wrongs. But has it learned the lessons of history? Apparently not.

Before the House of Commons is the proposed Bill C-31 — an omnibus bill on Canada’s refugee system. If passed, the bill has the potential to inflict untold pain and injustice on a whole new generation of asylum seekers.

Bill C-31 gives the government the power to detain refugees — including women and children — with no judicial oversight. It discriminates against asylum seekers based on their country of origin by allowing the minister to designate so-called “safe countries” and to deny refugees from those nations the right to appeal. Above all, the bill empowers the minister to deport legitimate refugees — even after they have become permanent residents — simply on the minister’s say-so that they will not face danger if returned to their home country.

Not only does this bill run contrary to the tradition of humanitarianism so many Canadians are proud of, it returns Canada to the days when racism and xenophobia were part of our official immigration policy.

Our history is replete with such examples of discrimination. Among the first to suffer from legally sanctioned racism were Chinese immigrants, who were subject first to a head tax and then to an immigration exclusion act, the sole purpose of both being to restrict and exclude people of Chinese descent.

During World War II, Japanese Canadians became refugees in their own country, declared personae non gratae by their own government. More than 22,000 Canadians of Japanese descent were sent to internment camps, and 4,000 more were deported to Japan, a country most of them had never set foot in.

Canadians also stood by while our government turned away Jews fleeing Nazi persecution because, in the words of an immigration officer, when it comes to Jews, “none is too many.”

A mere three decades later, the generosity of Canadians and our country finally shone. Collectively, Canadians put out our welcome mat for boatloads of Indochinese refugees. The then Progressive Conservative government of Joe Clark initiated a program to accept every Vietnamese refugee who arrived through private sponsorship. Canada has been enriched by these refugees-turned-citizens, who became an important part of the Canadian fabric and made significant contributions to the building of our nation.

Like canaries in the coal mine, conscientious and fair-minded Canadians are beginning to sense the toxins that are poisoning our country. They are beginning to question the fear-mongering and demonizing of the desperate people who are knocking on our door as they escape from global environmental, economic and political devastation.

By instilling fear instead of promoting compassion, Bill C-31 asks Canadians to turn our backs on those who need our assistance, and to forgo our core values as a just and open society. This is a bill that all fair-minded Canadians should reject.

Our government certainly has the right to design a refugee-determination system that would screen out illegitimate claims. But such a system must be tempered with compassion for asylum seekers and respect for the Charter of Rights and international law.

The government achieved that balance when it reached a compromise with the opposition parties to pass Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which gives all claimants the right to appeal while granting the government tools to speed up not-so-meritorious claims. Bill C-31, on the other hand, is overkill.

Let’s not forget that, aside from the aboriginal peoples, we are all immigrants and refugees, or their descendants.

Canadians deserve a balanced and compassionate approach to our immigration and refugee system. Let’s not repeat our historical wrongs. Let’s stop Bill C-31.