Punjab extends Amritpal Singh's NSA detention by a year

Who: Amritpal Singh, the Khadoor Sahib MP; the Punjab government's Home Department and the Amritsar District Magistrate; his nine co-accused in the Ajnala case; his father Tarsem Singh; and his counsel Imaan Singh Khara.

What: On 18 April 2025 PTI reported that Punjab had decided to extend Amritpal's detention under the National Security Act (NSA) by a year. The Tribune reported the next day that the Home Department had ordered it on the District Magistrate's recommendation, built on police and intelligence inputs. His detention was due to expire on 23 April 2025, two years after his arrest at Rode village in Moga, following a manhunt of more than a month after the 23 February 2023 Ajnala police station incident. It had been renewed in stages: The Tribune reported that orders dated 3 June 2024, the day before the election results, extended the NSA detention of Amritpal and nine aides by three months.

The Tribune called the new order a surprise, because Punjab had not extended the detention of the nine co-accused, who were brought back to Punjab from Dibrugarh in batches once their NSA terms ended. Senior police officials told the paper that Amritpal was an exception because there was additional evidence that he remained a threat to law and order. The Tribune also reported that a new case under the UAPA in Faridkot accuses him of joining hands with Arshdeep Dalla to plan the murder of his former associate Gurpreet Hari Nau.

On 20 April his father called the extension the murder of democracy. Khara called the detention illegal and said the family would go to the Punjab and Haryana High Court and, if needed, the Supreme Court.

Where: Dibrugarh Central Jail in Assam, where Amritpal and nine aides were moved after the NSA was invoked against them in 2023.

Why it mattered: Amritpal had won Khadoor Sahib as an independent in June 2024 by more than 1.97 lakh votes, and he stayed in a jail in Assam for another year as a sitting MP. The extension rested on the state's judgement that he would remain a threat, not on a conviction, and it set him apart from the nine men arrested with him.