Bhai Gurmeet Singh

Gurmeet Singh is one of the Bandi Singhs, the Sikh prisoners whom the SGPC and other Sikh bodies want released. He was convicted in the conspiracy to assassinate Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh in 1995 and sentenced to life. He is a different man from Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, the head of Dera Sacha Sauda. He is a living person, and what follows keeps to court and press records.

The case. The Tribune reported in February 2023 that he was arrested in 1995, has an engineering background and helped devise the bomb used to kill Beant Singh. A special CBI court convicted him on 27 July 2007 (Supreme Court, 3 May 2023) and sentenced him and Shamsher Singh to life imprisonment. A Punjab and Haryana High Court order of 22 March 2012 dates the sentencing, including Shamsher Singh's life term, 31 July 2007; The Tribune dates the life sentences 1 August 2007. A Division Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court is reported to have found that he, Lakhwinder Singh and Shamsher Singh acted as subordinates of Balwant Singh and Jagtar Singh Hawara, giving them logistical support. He was held in Burail Jail, Chandigarh.

Key moments

• 31 October 2022: the Chandigarh Administration declines his plea for premature release. On 13 December 2022 he goes to the High Court, arguing that he meets the Union Territory's conditions of 14 years in actual custody and 20 years in total, and that the refusal breaches Articles 14, 19 and 21 of the Constitution. Justice Avneesh Jhingan issues notice.
• January 2023: the High Court orders regular bail for life convicts who have completed their sentences while decisions on their premature release are pending.
• February 2023: with 27 years served, he is on the list of nine long-serving prisoners that the SGPC names in its release campaign, which by then had gathered about 13 lakh signed forms. In March 2023 the SGPC tells President Droupadi Murmu that by not releasing such prisoners the government is discriminating against them.
• 2 June 2023: the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Aman Inder Singh Sandhu, grants him regular bail on two sureties of Rs 2 lakh each. His family undertakes that he will return to jail if premature release is refused. His co-convict Lakhwinder Singh had been bailed in May 2023, and Shamsher Singh follows on 20 September 2023.
• 4 March 2024: after the Chandigarh Administration declines premature release to him and Shamsher Singh and they do not surrender, the magistrate cancels their bail bonds and issues non-bailable warrants. A notice sent to Gurmeet Singh's house is returned with the house found locked. The reports opened here give no later update.

Remembered for. The SGPC lists him among the prisoners it says are being discriminated against by not being released. The Chandigarh Administration has refused his premature release and a court issued warrants after he did not surrender, so his status is unsettled in the sources opened here.