Chandigarh: The Delhi Police special cell on Tuesday arrested a Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) operative, Akashdeep Singh alias Baaz, from Indore for his role in a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attack on Qila Lal Singh Wala police station in Batala police district of Punjab on April 6 night.Announcing the arrest on Wednesday, New Delhi range deputy commissioner of police (special cell) Amit Kaushik said they had been working on the case after BKI claimed responsibility for the police station attack and threatened to carry out an attack in Delhi too.According to a Punjab Police official, Akashdeep is a resident of Chandanke village in the Amritsar district and “arranged for logistics for the perpetrators of the grenade attack”. The official said Akashdeep worked outside Punjab and arranged for the stay of those who carried out the attack. The official added Akashdeep had no criminal past.A Punjab Police officer said the investigation of the grenade attack had been handed over to NIA two weeks ago.BKI operatives Happy Passia and Manu Agwan, along with gangster Gopi Nawanshahria, had claimed responsibility for the grenade attack, which, according to a Punjab police officer, “missed the target”. Passia, who was among those behind a series of such grenade attacks targeting police establishments and other places in the state, was arrested in the US on April 17.Kaushik said Akashdeep was in touch with foreign-based BKI handlers. The DCP said prima facie it emerged that Akashdeep played a “facilitating role, but it would be difficult to say anything conclusively right now”. The DCP said Akashdeep came in touch with his handlers on social media. The DCP said that as per information with the special cell, Akashdeep was earlier in Gujarat and then moved to Indore, where he was arrested. “He was in Gujarat after the incident. Efforts were made to track him in Gujarat. Since he had been changing his location, he could not be tracked there. When he moved to Indore, we succeeded in tracking him,” said the DSP, adding that Akashdeep was working as a “crane driver, both in Surat in Gujarat and in Indore” in Madhya Pradesh.The DCP said the special cell started working on the BKI module after a social media post by Passia, Agwan, and Nawanshahria, where they threatened that Delhi should remain on “alert mode” as they claimed responsibility for the grenade attack on the police station in Punjab.
