Iqbal Singh Lalpura

Iqbal Singh Lalpura, born on 7 February 1953, is a retired Punjab-cadre IPS officer who became a Bharatiya Janata Party leader and, from September 2021, Chairman of the National Commission for Minorities. The Tribune lists his police posts as AIG CID Amritsar, SSP Amritsar City, SSP Tarn Taran, SSP Kapurthala, SSP Amritsar Rural and AIG CID Jalandhar, and says he was the investigating officer for the 1978 Sikh-Nirankari clash. Wikipedia adds that he holds the President's Police Medal.

Key moments

• 1981: The Tribune says that in April 1981 he was one of three officers formed into a team to arrest Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, who agreed to be arrested but demanded that only baptised officers do it. The others were Jarnail Singh Chahal and SDM B S Bhullar. ThePrint says he was then senior superintendent of police at Tarn Taran. The date is uncertain: the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism records that Bhindranwale offered himself for arrest on 20 September 1981, after the murder of Lala Jagat Narain on 9 September, and does not mention an April arrest.
• 2012: after retiring he joined the BJP and became a party spokesperson. He later held Punjab BJP posts, and ThePrint reports that in August 2022 he was appointed to the party's parliamentary board.
• 8 September 2021: appointed Chairman of the National Commission for Minorities, a few months before the Punjab elections. The Tribune counted 14 books by him on Sikh scripture and history, among them Japji Sahib ik vichaar, Gurbani katha vichaar and Raaj karega khalsa.
• 16 September 2022: in an interview with ThePrint he called Narendra Modi a "better Sikh than most of us", citing the Kartarpur corridor, the removal of Sikh foreign nationals from a blacklist and the repeal of the farm laws. He proposed a truth and reconciliation commission to heal the wounds of the years of conflict in Punjab, called the real problem a proxy war run by people abroad and in Pakistan, and blamed farmer unions and other vested interests for a "Sikhs versus Government of India" narrative during the farmers' protest. Wikipedia records that the remark about Modi drew criticism.
• 2 November 2022: according to Wikipedia, the Shiromani Akali Dal asked the President to dismiss him, alleging interference in Sikh religious affairs and in the SGPC.
• April 2025: his term as chairman ended, according to Wikipedia. On 16 July 2026 the Centre nominated Harjit Singh Grewal as the commission's new chairperson.

Remembered for: being a baptised Sikh police officer placed at one of the hinge moments of 1981, and then a BJP office-holder who speaks to Sikhs for the government. He is an interested party on both counts, a former officer of the years of conflict and a serving party man, so statements attributed to him on that period are his own account.