Man arrested after burnt pictures of Golden Temple, Sikh Gurus found dumped on road

Division A police arrested a man on the charges of hurting religious sentiments after he allegedly set some pictures of the Golden Temple and Sikh Gurus on fire and dumped them on the roadside. Jasroop Kaur Bath, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police, City-III, while sharing details said that the burnt pictures of Golden Temple and Sikh Gurus were found dumped by the roadside. Activists of some Sikh organisation found them and raised the issue. “As information reached the police, it swung into action and registered a case and began the process to identify the suspects who had set the pictures on fire,” said ADCP Bath. A case under section 298 (destroying, damaging or defiling any place of worship or sacred object, with the intention of insulting a religion, knowing it will likely be considered an insult) and section 238 (causing the disappearance of evidence of an offence or giving false information to screen an offender) of the BNS has been registered in this connection. The accused was identified as Surinder Yadav, who originally hails from Bihar and runs a tea stall in the market. A resident of Golden Avenue area here, he has been residing in the city for over a decade. Investigations revealed that the owner of a shop located opposite his tea stall asked him to clean the shop. It had been closed for over a decade because of some dispute with the Improvement Trust, police said. He had recently got the ownership and asked Yadav to clean the shop and remove the old and waste material from there. Yadav, a resident of Golden Avenue, allegedly took out the old pictures of Golden Temple and Sikh Gurus among other material and set them on fire. The ADCP said the police have called the shop owner for investigations. His role would also be ascertained in the incident.

Amritsar