Delhi police nabs two in Punjab for pro-Khalistan graffiti at Delhi metro stations

The Delhi police have taken two people into custody in the pro-Khalistan graffiti case, CP Special Cell Delhi Police HS Dhaliwal informed on Thursday.

Dhaliwal, while talking to the press, said that both the people responsible for the notorious graffiti had been nabbed from Punjab.

The duo travelled to Delhi via the Punjab mail on the intervening night of 25-26 August. Upon reaching Delhi they recced suitable places and spray-painted the graffiti in the evening before leaving for Punjab on 27 August, Dhaliwal said while divulging the details of how the plan was carried on.

VIDEO | “Pritpal Singh from Punjab’s Faridkot has been arrested while Rajwinder Singh has been detained and is being brought to Delhi where he will be arrested. FIRs transferred to Special Cell,” says Special CP of Special Cell @hgsdhaliwalips on the case related to pro-Khalistan… pic.twitter.com/I9y6VZSmzJ

— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) August 31, 2023

Ahead of the next month’s G20 meet pro-Khalistan slogans appeared on the walls of a few Delhi Metro stations on Sunday evening.  Shivaji Park, Madipur, Paschim Vihar, Udyog Nagar, and Maharaja Surajmal Stadium metro stations had slogans saying ‘Delhi Banega Khalistan’ and ‘Khalistan Zindabad’. Besides the stations, a wall of a government school in Nangloi was also found defaced.

After the slogans were discovered, the banned outfit Sikhs for Justice (SFJ) released a video showing the defaced walls of the Metro stations.

Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, spokesperson for the SFJ, said in the video, “G20 nations, when you will be meeting in Delhi on September 10, we will be organising a Khalistan referendum in Canada.”

According to a News18 report earlier this month, pro-Khalistan groups were exploiting youth to carry out propaganda.

Although no organised group has been named in the graffiti case so far, Khalistani entities were actively looking for youth with anti-India sentiments on social media, according to the report.

“The group gradually started radicalising them with their agenda and showing a pathetic picture of Indian Sikhs. They show them 1984 riots visuals and teach them about Operation Blue Star. These youths were mainly born after 1984 and they are in the grip of these Khalistani gangs,” a top intelligence source was quoted as saying by News18.

“They ask them to carry out the task of painting walls and putting up flags with a promise of $1,000-2,000. When police remove such graffiti, the boys are refused payment,” the source had added.

Earlier this year in January, ahead of Republic Day also, “anti-national” and “Khalistan-related” were discovered written on walls in West Delhi. Two men were later arrested in the case.