Former Indian cricketer senior Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu was released from Patiala jail today after serving a 10-month sentence for a road-rage incident that resulted in a man’s death 35 years ago. Although he was awarded a one-year jail sentence in May last year in a 1988 road rage case, he was released two months early due to his good behaviour in the prison.
The 59-year-old former cricketer-turned-politician addressed the media outside the jail after he was released. During this time, a crowd of his supporters was seen outside the jail. Navjot Singh Sidhu’s supporters welcomed him by playing drums.
#WATCH | Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu released from Patiala jail, approximately 10 months after he was sentenced to one-year jail by Supreme Court in a three decades old road rage case pic.twitter.com/kzVB2vMnpk
— ANI (@ANI) April 1, 2023
During his media interaction, Navjot Singh Sidhu said, “There is no such thing as democracy right now. There is a conspiracy to bring President’s Rule in Punjab. Minorities are being targeted. If you try to weaken Punjab, you will become weak.”
Patiala | There is no such thing as democracy right now. Conspiracy to bring President’s Rule in Punjab. Minorities being targeted. If you try to weaken Punjab, you will become weak: Navjot Singh Sidhu soon after his release from Patiala jail pic.twitter.com/64UTOaCUJM
— ANI (@ANI) April 1, 2023
‘Wherever minorities are in majority, the central government conspires. First a problem of law and order is created, and then in an attempt to suppress it, it is claimed that we pacified it,’ he added.
Sidhu also called Rahul Gandhi a revolution. He said that whenever dictatorship appears in the country, then a revolution comes to defeat it, and now that revolution is Rahul Gandhi. ‘The ancestors of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi had liberated the country. Rahul Gandhi is a revolution that will shake the very roots of the central government,” he claimed.
He also claimed that there was a conspiracy to keep him in jail for a longer time. ‘I was to be released around noon but they delayed it. They wanted the media people to leave,’ he alleged.
Sidhu also didn’t spare the AAP govt in Punjab, saying that CM Bhagwant Mann has been reduced to a tabloid chief minister. Talking about the deteriorating law and order situation in the state and withdrawal of his security, he said, “One Sidhu (Sidhu Moosewala) has been killed, kill the other one too.”
Sidhu’s release date was announced on his Twitter account yesterday, March 31. He is reportedly getting released two months before the end of his sentence for his ‘good behaviour.’ His family also got an intimation from authorities regarding his release from the Patiala jail.
This is to inform everyone that Sardar Navjot Singh Sidhu will be released from Patiala Jail tomorrow.
— Navjot Singh Sidhu (@sherryontopp) March 31, 2023
(As informed by the concerned authorities).
Sidhu was imprisoned on May 20 last year after surrendering to a Patiala court and receiving a one-year severe punishment sentence from the Supreme Court in the case. The family of the victim had sought a harsher sentence and a reconsideration of the Supreme Court’s 2018 decision clearing him of murder.
Sidhu’s lawyer HPS Verma informed that the Punjab Congress leader is getting an early release under the state’s general remission policy. “Navjot Singh Sidhu’s scheduled release was in May, but for all prisoners with good conduct, all Sunday holidays get deducted from the sentence period. Therefore, he is getting a 48-day remission,” he stated.
On December 27, 1988, Patiala resident Gurnam Singh and Navjot Singh Sidhu got into a fight over a parking space. The former MP and his friend, Rupinder Singh Sandhu, dragged the latter out of his car and hit him. He later died in a hospital. The Congress leader was accused by an eyewitness of killing the latter with a strike to the head.
The duo had parked their Gypsy in the middle of the road near the Sheranwala Gate crossing in Patiala. When the elderly man reached the spot in a car, he asked them to make room for his vehicle which lead to a violent altercation between them.
