Punjab minister and former cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu landed himself in a soup on August 20. A case of sedition was filed against him for hugging the Pakistan Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa during his visit to Pakistan, reported IANS.
On August 18, Sidhu was in Islamabad to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Imran Khan as the country’s prime minister. Sidhu’s actions received flak from several political parties while his own party too criticised him.
According to the IANS report, the case was filed by lawyer Sudhur Ojha in Muzaffarpur’s Chief Judicial Magistrate court under various sections of the Indian Penal Code involving sedition. The lawyer’s complaint stated that Sidhu’s gesture hurt the people of the country.
“The court has admitted the case and will hear it next week,” Ojha told IANS.
On August 19, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh criticised Sidhu by saying, “Every day, our jawans are getting martyred. To hug their Chief General Bajwa… I am against this. The fact is that the man should understand that our soldiers are being killed. My own regiment lost one major and two jawans a few months ago and everyday somebody is being shot.”
The chief minister added that the Minister of Local Government, Tourism, Cultural Affairs, and Museums of the State of Punjab attended the oath-taking ceremony in his personal capacity and the gesture had nothing to do with his government or the Congress party.
Sidhu was one amongst the several special guests invited for the ceremony and Sidhu was seated next to Masood Khan, the president of the part of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir that Islamabad calls “Azad Jammu and Kashmir”.
On Saturday, the Hindustan Times reported that Sidhu claimed he hugged Bajwa because the general said that Pakistan may allow Sikh pilgrims direct access to Gurdwara Darbar Sahib Kartarpur next year. “Without my asking, I received this precious gift,” he said. “General Bajwa hugged me and said they were thinking of opening the Kartarpur route during Guru Nanak’s 550th birth anniversary celebrations. I had been thinking our chief minister [Amarinder Singh] would take this up with Pakistan, but the general made this gracious gesture on his own. He also said we want peace.”
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