Paramraj Singh Umranangal

Paramraj Singh Umranangal is an officer of the Indian Police Service in the Punjab cadre, with the rank of Inspector General of Police (IGP). He is named as an accused in the cases over the police firing on Sikh protesters at Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan on 14 October 2015. The allegations below are those of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) and the press, not findings of a court; no conviction has been reported in the sources cited here.

Key moments

• 14 October 2015: police fired on protesters against the Bargari sacrilege at Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan in Faridkot district. Two protesters were killed at Behbal Kalan (The Tribune).
• 18 February 2019: the SIT arrested him in Chandigarh. Officials alleged that he directed police at Kotkapura to use firearms to disperse protesters sitting at the main chowk on 14 October 2015 (The Tribune).
• 2019 to 2021: he was suspended three times, in February 2019, November 2020 and March 2021. Two orders concerned the firing cases and one an FIR under the narcotics law.
• September 2020 and 15 January 2021: the SIT named him and former DGP Sumedh Singh Saini as accused, and filed a supplementary chargesheet in the Behbal Kalan case. The SIT alleged that he was in constant contact with Saini and, after Saini's directions, told the Moga SSP Charanjit Singh Sharma and others to use force on the protesters. The court summoned both for 9 February 2021 (The Tribune).
• 2 February 2024: the Punjab and Haryana High Court quashed his suspension in CWP 3087 of 2023. After he filed a contempt petition, the Court said on 5 July 2024 that there were no grounds to stop him joining duty.
• 11 July 2024: the Punjab government reinstated him with immediate effect and told him to report to the Director General of Police for duties (The Tribune). The Tribune's headline says this came five years after his suspension. The first of his three suspensions was in February 2019.

Where it stands: the Tribune's reports describe him as named as an accused in the firing cases, which it calls allegations rather than findings. None of the reports cited here records a verdict, or a response from him to the allegations.