Six people have been arrested by the SIT probing the incidents of the desecration of a religious text in Punjab's Faridkot in 2015

Chandigarh: Six people have been arrested by the SIT probing the incidents of the desecration of a religious text in Punjab's Faridkot in 2015, an official said on Saturday.

The arrests by the Punjab Police Special Investigation Team (SIT) came amid a demand by several ruling Congress leaders for early action in the desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib and subsequent police firing incidents in Faridkot.

Arrest

The SIT is led by Inspector General of Police S P S Parmar.

Assistant Inspector General Rajinder Singh Sohal, who is member of the SIT, confirmed about the arrest of the six persons, identified as Sukhjinder Singh, Shakti Singh, Ranjit Singh, Baljit Singh, Nishan Singh and Pardeep Kumar.

They will be produced in a Faridkot Court on Monday.

They had been booked in connection with three sacrilege incidents which had taken place in Faridkot in 2015.

SIT arrests

In February this year, the CBI on the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court had handed over the documents and files related to the 2015 incidents to the Punjab Police SIT.

The previous SAD-BJP government had handed over the three cases -- theft of a 'bir' (copy) of the Guru Granth Sahib from a Burj Jawahar Singh Wala gurdwara; putting up of handwritten sacrilegious posters in Bargari and Burj Jawahar Singh Wala; and torn pages of the holy book found at Bargari--to the CBI for probe.

The Punjab government had handed over the probe to an SIT of the state police in September 2018 after the state Assembly passed a resolution withdrawing consent to the CBI to investigate these cases, noting lack of progress in the investigation.