Newdelhi: The Intelligence Bureau has informed the Supreme Court that transferring Beant Singh murder convict Jagtar Singh Hawara from Delhi's Tihar Jail to a facility in Punjab could significantly influence the upcoming state elections and public safety. The security agency also designated Hawara as a high-risk inmate who should remain outside of Punjab, where elections for the 117-member assembly are scheduled for early next year.
A bench comprising Justices M M Sundresh and P B Varale described the Intelligence Bureau's submission as a very damning report during an exchange with senior advocate S Muralidhar. Counsel suggested that if electoral concerns were paramount, the matter could be deferred by three months, prompting the bench to reschedule the hearing for February of next year.
Previously, the Supreme Court instructed the Delhi government to obtain the Intelligence Bureau's assessment regarding Hawara's request for relocation from Tihar Jail to Punjab. Hawara, a member of Babbar Khalsa, is currently serving a life sentence for his role in the August 1995 assassination of then-Punjab chief minister Beant Singh, an explosion at the Chandigarh civil secretariat that claimed the lives of Beant Singh and 16 others.
Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, representing the Delhi government, previously highlighted Hawara's involvement in a past jailbreak and noted that his initial death penalty was commuted to life imprisonment. Bhati cautioned that relocating Hawara heightened the risk of escape, pointing to a Union Home Ministry advisory concerning high-risk detainees. Referencing an affidavit submitted by the Punjab administration, she added that the transfer might destabilize local law and order and mentioned Hawara's past involvement in digging an escape tunnel at Chandigarh's Burail Jail.
In September of the previous year, the Supreme Court initiated proceedings by issuing notices to the Centre, the Chandigarh administration, and the governments of Delhi and Punjab regarding the transfer application. Hawara's legal petition contended that his prison record has otherwise been clean aside from the January 2004 escape, arguing that he should be moved to Punjab because no active legal cases remain against him in Delhi.
Hawara, alongside Paramjit Singh Bheora, Tara, and Devi Singh, had escaped from the high-security Burail Jail by tunneling nearly 100 feet. While Hawara and Bheora were recaptured within two years and Tara was later apprehended in Thailand, Devi Singh remains a fugitive. Hawara's petition emphasized his native roots in Punjab's Fatehgarh Sahib district and stated that his family, including his daughter, resides in the state.
The petition further claimed that numerous ungrounded cases were brought against Hawara following the assassination, resulting in acquittals in all but one matter, and noted that another co-accused involved in the jailbreak had already been transferred from Tihar to Chandigarh. It argued that past high-risk classifications no longer justified keeping him confined in Delhi.
A trial court initially handed down a death sentence to Hawara in March 2007, which the Punjab and Haryana High Court later modified in October 2010 to a life sentence without the possibility of release for the remainder of his natural life. With cross-appeals still pending before the Supreme Court, the judiciary has chosen to postpone further deliberations on the transfer plea until February in light of the security warnings.