On Friday, former Punjab Congress chairman Navjot Singh Sidhu will turn himself in a court in his native Patiala in Punjab in connection with a road rage case that occurred in 1988 and resulted in him being convicted and sentenced to a year of hard jail time by the Supreme Court of India.
To show their support for Sidhu, leaders from the Indian National Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party traveled to his home just before his surrender. Sidhu is a former politician and three-term member of parliament for the city of Amritsar (East). In April of 2016, the government of Narendra Modi put Sidhu forward for election to the Rajya Sabha. He joined Congress two days before the 2017 Assembly elections.
Earlier, the Patiala District Congress Committee chief, Narinder Pal Lali, stated that Sidhu would approach the court for surrender at 10.30 a.m. and encouraged supporters to get to the court complex at about 9.30 a.m. to avoid any delays. The most recent information suggests that he intends to turn himself in at the courthouse after lunch.
Navjot Kaur Sidhu, who served as a candidate for the SAD-BJP in the election for Amritsar (East) from 2012 to 2017, arrived in Patiala late on Thursday. As a direct result of the ruling made by the Supreme Court, Sidhu made the statement that he would be “subject to the grandeur of the law.”
Sidhu, who has been harshly criticized for his own party’s policies and leaders, tweeted Thursday, “Will bow to the grandeur of law…” Sidhu isn’t immune to criticism, even from his party and leaders.
The judgment was announced when Sidhu, who was riding an elephant at the time, and party workers were rallying against a price hike in Patiala, which was the location of the road rage incident that occurred in 1988.
The family of Gurnam Singh, who was murdered in the incident, petitioned the Supreme Court to revisit its decision in 2018 to decrease the punishment for Sidhu. This resulted in the court’s reconsideration of its earlier ruling.
Gurnam Singh, 65, was hit in the head by the cricketer-turned-politician and a friend in 1988. It happened outside Patiala’s Sheranwala Gate.
Sidhu fled the crime scene quickly after committing it, according to authorities. Gurnam Singh died at the hospital.
Sidhu said Gurnam Singh died of a heart attack, not a head injury. In September 1999, a judge cleared Sidhu of murder charges. Sidhu and his co-defendant were convicted of criminal homicide in December 2006. Three years in prison and a 100,000 rupee fine each.
When Sidhu and Sandhu challenged their death sentences to the Supreme Court in 2007, they were given a stay of execution. The Supreme Court acquitted the defendant of criminal responsibility but found him guilty of inflicting bodily harm on the victim of a road rage incident. The incident resulted in the death of one person.
In its verdict on May 15, 2018, the highest court let Sidhu off with a small Rs 1,000 fine. In February 2022, the apex court accepted a petition to review that ruling, which asked the court to reconsider its decision.