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The 58-year-old former Punjab Congress president on Friday surrendered earlier than a courtroom in Patiala, a day after the Supreme Court docket sentenced him to one-year rigorous imprisonment in a 1988 highway rage case.
Sidhu surrendered shortly after 4pm and was taken for the necessary medical examination, performed on the Mata Kaushalya Hospital. After the medical check-up, he was lodged within the Patiala jail the place he’s more likely to spend the subsequent yr.
Certainly, the political fortunes of the previous cricketer have witnessed an enormous downturn in comparison with a yr in the past, when he was having fun with the assist of dozens of MLAs and was the potential face of the Congress’s Punjab marketing campaign.
34-year-old case comes again to hang-out Sidhu
In 1988, Sidhu and one in every of his associates Rupinder Singh Sandhu had allegedly hit one Gurnam Singh on his head following an altercation in Patiala.
Gurnam Singh, 65, later died.
Shortly after Singh’s dying, Sidhu and his affiliate had been booked on fees of homicide.
In 1999, Sidhu was acquitted of the homicide fees by a trial courtroom. Nevertheless, the Punjab excessive courtroom reversed the decision and held Sidhu and his co-accused responsible of culpable murder not amounting to homicide in December 2006. It sentenced them to 3 years in jail and imposed a effective of Rs 1 lakh every.
Each Sidhu and Sandhu filed an attraction within the Supreme Court docket, which stayed their conviction in 2007.
In 2018, the Supreme Court docket acquitted Sidhu of culpable murder and convicted him of inflicting damage within the highway rage case. He was let off with a mere Rs 1,000 effective.
Nevertheless, in February 2022, the apex courtroom agreed to listen to a plea searching for a evaluation of its Might 15, 2018 verdict.
Overturning its personal resolution, the highest courtroom on Thursday noticed that any “undue sympathy” to impose an insufficient sentence would do extra hurt to the justice system and undermine the general public confidence within the efficacy of legislation.
“Within the given circumstances, tempers could have been misplaced however then the results of the lack of mood have to be borne,” the courtroom stated, because it sentenced Sidhu to one-year imprisonment.
Reversal of fortunes
Sidhu’s sentencing and subsequent imprisonment come at a time when the political chief is struggling to remain related in a celebration that itself suffered a significant rout within the current Punjab elections.
Final yr, after efficiently engineering the removing of Amarinder, Sidhu was set to be the highest Congress draw from Punjab. It was broadly anticipated that the Congress would choose the fiery chief as its chief ministerial face within the elections.
Nevertheless, the primary blow got here after the Congress not solely picked then little-known Charanjit Channi for the highest publish but in addition continued with him all through the election marketing campaign.
Congress’s reluctance to call the previous cricketer as its CM face could have been a calculated transfer to keep away from infighting, however it did reduce Sidhu’s political ambition all the way down to dimension.
After a drubbing within the ensuing polls, Sidhu was forged apart additional as occasion chief Sonia Gandhi requested him – together with 4 different state Congress presidents – to resign from the publish.
Since then, Sidhu had made a number of remarks towards Channi, his occasion, the management and generally in favour of the Congress’s opponents (learn present Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann).
The chief’s remarks have left many guessing about his political plans for the longer term.
Notably, in 2017, Sidhu had converted to the Congress from the BJP forward of the 2017 meeting polls.
Nevertheless, with a 34-year-old case coming again to hang-out him once more, Sidhu’s political ambitions will seemingly stay in limbo for now.
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