Balwinder Singh Jhabal

Balwinder Singh Jhabal was a head constable in the Tarn Taran police who, in July 1995, publicly described the pressure that SSP Ajit Singh Sandhu was putting on families who had gone to the High Court about disappeared relatives. Reduced to Ashes describes him as the nephew of a prominent Congress leader; the police later said he had joined the force in 1974. After he left the police he became a human rights activist, and after Sandhu's death in 1997 he helped a police witness reach the CBI in the Khalra case.

Key moments (all as the book reports them)

• 8 March 1993: according to Balwinder, his wife's brother, a member of the Jhabal village council, was arrested from his house, tortured in the middle of the village by a team from Jhabal police station under SHO Balbir Singh and ASI Bikramjit Singh, and driven away when he lost consciousness; he was never heard of again.
• November 1994: his father-in-law Avtar Singh petitioned the High Court for an impartial inquiry (writ no. 853/94); the court admitted it and issued notice to the state.
• 1994 to July 1995: As reported from the press conference, he said that SSP Ajit Singh Sandhu had told him to make his father-in-law withdraw the petition or face serious consequences. He said that when he could not do so the SSP ordered his demotion to a small police post under Valtoha police station, his application for leave was refused, and his superiors warned him of dismissal. He fell ill, was then allowed leave, and in July was allowed to apply for early retirement; he said officers visited his house several times in his absence and threatened his wife.
• 28 July 1995: he appeared at Jaswant Singh Khalra's press conference in Amritsar. The Punjabi daily Ajit put his case on its front page the next day.
• 5 August 1995: "senior officers of Tarn Taran police" issue a joint rebuttal. They say he had been punished before for dereliction of duty, used political connections for easy postings, and was shown by an inquiry to be mentally ill and often away from home. The book reports this as the police's statement and gives no evidence for it.
• 1997 to 1998: SPO Kuldip Singh hears Balwinder, by then a human rights activist, and Paramjit Kaur Khalra speak at a public meeting and meets him privately. Balwinder gets in touch with the CBI officers on the case, who invite Kuldip Singh to Delhi, where he gives his first formal statement on 2 March 1998. Balwinder later goes with him to Jhabal police station to ask for protection (pp. 57 to 58, 65).

What he is remembered for. The book reads the public exchanges of July and August 1995 between Khalra and the Tarn Taran police as a sign that the clash was coming to a head (p. 59). He is remembered as the policeman who spoke in the open and was branded ill by his superiors.