CHANDIGARH: Former Punjab DGP Sumedh Singh Saini is on the run from the law as a police team raided his house today early morning here to arrest him in a 29-year old murder case but the former top cop was not to be found at his house at that time.
Sources said a team of Mohali police, Chandigarh police and the SOG (Special Operations Group) raided his Sector 20 house around 5:30 today morning but they could not find him. Also his farm houses in Mohali and in Himachal Pradesh and his house in Delhi were raided but police was not able to trace him.
On May 6 this year, Saini along with six other police officers - DSP Baldev Singh, sub-inspectors Satbir Singh, Harsahai, Jagir Singh, Anoop Singh and Kuldeep Singh - was booked on charges of kidnapping or
abduction in order to murder, causing disappearance of evidence, wrongful confinement, voluntarily causing hurt to exhort confession and criminal conspiracy in a 29-year-old case of former CITCO employee Balwant Singh Multani who was the son of former IAS officer Darshan Singh Multani at Mataur police station in Mohali.
On the complaint of the deceased's brother Palwainder Singh Multani, it was alleged that Balwant was unlawfully abducted, inhumanly tortured and killed in custody by Saini and the police personnel under his command in 1991. A Mohali court had added Section 302 of the IPC in the case against Saini recently.
The court of additional district and sessions judge of Mohlai (ADJ) Rajnish Garg yesterday reserved its orders on Saini’s anticipatory bail petition for August 29 for staying his arrest. The judge has not passed any orders on the interim stay on the arrest of Saini.
Recently two official of Chandigarh police, who are now retired and named in the case, turned approvers in the case and gave details how Multani was allegedly picked, tortured and killed.
In their statement in the court they have alleged that they were the eyewitness to when Multani was tortured under custody of Saini and then shifted in a Gypsy in an unconscious state. Later they were told that Multani had gone missing. Sources said that the two police officials also allegedly they were asked to declare Multani as missing which they did.
On the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court in 2007, a CBI probe was initiated in this case against Saini but later it was quashed by Supreme Court.
At the time of the incident, Saini was SSP of Chandigarh Police. Multani was picked up by two officers after a terrorist attack on Saini in Chandigarh in which four policemen deployed in his security cover were killed.