Majithia skips SIT summons in 2021 drugs case

Shiromani Akali Dal leader (SAD) Bikram Singh Majithia failed to appear before the special investigation team (SIT) probing a 2021 drugs case against him on Thursday.

On July 10, the SIT had issued fresh summons to the SAD leader to appear before it for questioning at the Patiala police lines on July 18. The summons were issued under Section 160 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).

Expressing his inability to appear before the SIT, Majithia on Thursday morning shot off a letter to the probe team saying he had to appear for hearing of another case in Amritsar court.

In the letter to the SIT, the SAD leader said he had to appear in the defamation case against Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, AAP Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh and others in the court of chief judicial magistrate, Amritsar, on July 18.

“I have appeared before all the four SITs whenever I was asked to and extended full cooperation as a law-abiding citizen in the investigation. I am bound by the directions of the hon’ble court to attend the proceedings at Amritsar today i.e.18/07/2024. The summons issued by the SIT gives the impression that I am being deterred to attend the court to seek my legal recourse against a senior member of AAP, which is the ruling dispensation in Punjab,” reads the letter.

Majithia pleaded that as the SIT had filed a special leave petition in the Supreme Court seeking cancelation of his regular bail granted by the Punjab and Haryana high court in this case, which had been listed for hearing on July 23, he should be given a fresh date as he had to assist his counsels for the SC hearing.

However, the SIT again summoned Majithia to appear before it on July 20. A member of the SIT said the probe team had every right to summon him on July 20. “The SC hearing is on July 23 and we have summoned him on July 20. There is nothing wrong in this,” he said.

Majithia was booked under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act on December 20, 2021, during the tenure of the Charanjit Singh Channi-led Congress government that acted on the probe report of the anti-drug special task force in 2018.