Personal enmity led to Cong block chief’s killing; 3 held

A day after a block president of the Congress was shot dead by two unidentified assailants at his residence in Dala village in Moga, the district police on Tuesday arrested three persons belonging to the same village terming the killing part of “personal enmity”. The deceased, Baljinder Singh Bali, was party’s Ajitgarh block chief.

As per police sources, the accused had given a contract to gangsters to kill Bali. However, the Moga police have failed to identify and trace the shooters involved in the killing so far.

The arrested accused have been identified as Sukhvir Singh, alias Seera, Hardeep Singh, alias Deepu, and Jagjit Singh, alias Jagga, of Dala village. The police have also named Gurcharan Singh Sidhu of Takhanwadh village in Moga as an accused. Sidhu, who is a trainer in the village gym, is yet to be arrested.

Bali (45) was shot dead at the main gate of his residence by two shooters. Bali’s wife Karamjit Kaur in her statement said Bali, in his last moments, told her that Sukhvir, Deepu, Jagga and Sidhu had sent the assailants to kill him. She said the reason behind the enmity was the ongoing court case between Bali and the accused. “There was a hearing of one of the cases on Monday following which they got my husband killed through unidentified assailants,” she added.

Dharamkot deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Ravinder Singh said three accused have been arrested. “We are interrogating them to get details. As per the victim’s family, the accused had enmity with Bali and some cases are also under trial in court between them. We are trying to identify the shooters and investigating the gangsters’ link in this case,” he added.

Canada-based gangster Arsh Dala had taken the responsibility for the murder on social media.