CHANDIGARH, Punjab—A Nawanshehar based Court of Additional Sessions Judge Randhir Sharma on February 5 addressed life imprisonment to three Sikh youths namely Arwinder Singh (Nawashehr), Surjit Singh (Gurdaspur) and Ranjit Singh (Kaithal, Haryana) just for possessing printed biography of Shaheed Bhai Sukhdev Singh Babbar, photographs of 13 martyred Sikhs of 1978 and a mobile phone. The trio Sikh youths have been addressed life sentence by holding them guilty under sections 121 (waging, or attempting to wage war, or abetting waging of war, against the Government of India) and 121-A (conspiring to commit offences punishable by section 121) of the Indian Penal Code.

It may be recalled here that all of these Sikh youths were arrested in May-2016 by the police. Later, the police had cooked a “special story” about their arrest and had claimed recovery of 97 books, 198 photographs, 13 photographs of 1978’s martyrs and 1000 books related to Shaheed Bhai Sukhdev Singh Babbar while accusing one of these Sikh youths of pasting pro-Khalistan posters at Sri Anandpur Sahib.

The judgment of the case reveals that the Judge sentenced the trio Sikh youths just on the basis of the statements given by 21 prosecution witnesses. Interestingly, all of these prosecution witnesses were the Police cops.

Meanwhile, Advocate Jaspal Singh Manjhpur has stated that the Court’s verdict has many flaws and the Judge delivered a biased decision proving himself a tool of the Indian state.