Chandigarh, June 29
The Uttarakhand police today finally lodged an FIR in the case of assault on Punjab Director General of School Education Kahan Singh Pannu during rescue operations in the hill state about a week ago.
The case was registered against unidentified persons at Joshimath police station in Chamoli district under Section 332 (voluntarily causing hurt to deter a public servant from delivering his duty), 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
Chamoli Superintendent of Police Ajay Joshi said, “I received a copy of Pannu's complaint, forwarded by the Punjab Government, today itself... We will have to trace the assailants, mostly outsiders (from Punjab).”
Joshi, however, refused to comment on whether anybody had been detained for questioning.
Pannu had submitted a detailed complaint about the incident to the Chief Secretary, which was forwarded to Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. A section of the crowd had resorted to “unprovoked” physical assault on the officer during the relief operations following flash floods at Gobind Ghat in the hill state.
While Pannu claimed the group got infuriated when he turned down their demand for priority in evacuation, the attackers had alleged the officer used foul language. After the FIR, the investigations will be transferred to the Punjab Police.
Punjab has already constituted a Special Investigation Team under Inspector General of Police Sanjeev Kalra, which will tie up with their Uttarakhand counterparts for the probe.
