The arrest of Deputy Superintendent of Police of Jammu and Kashmir -Davinder Singh while travelling with two Kashmiri militants in South Kashmir, on way to Delhi, is not going to be digested easily by those who have been following the deeds of the police officer and his deputies in the last decade. Punjab political party -Dal Khalsa, which keeps an eye on Kashmir has questioned the role of the police officer, once decorated by the President of India.

THE WHOLE EPISODE IS FISHY and justice-seeking people in India and the world monitoring developments in Kashmir need to know the truth, commented Dal Khalsa chief Harpal Singh Cheema, in the party’s official reaction to the detention of Jammu and Kashmir police officer Davinder Singh.

Dal Khalsa president Harpal Singh Cheema, in a statement issued here today, said that his party believed that the arrest of DSP Davinder Singh, former counter-insurgency officer of J and K police alongside two “militants”, one of whom was involved in the killing of migrant labourers last October has opened a Pandora’s box which the Jammu and Kashmir police and administration will find difficult to put the lid on.

“Was Davinder Singh a double agent minting money from both sides? Was he a mole in the police working for a third agency? Was he a hero of the state that used him for overt and covert operations? Who were his senior handlers and why they haven’t protected him at the time of his arrest? What was the reality behind Afzal’s pointing finger towards him?”

In the last 72 hours since his arrest, while the social media remained abuzz about the role of Davinder Singh, skeletons from the past started pouring out. He is the same police officer about whom Afzal Guru’s counsel had apprised the court through a letter before being sent to the gallows, but the court had not taken cognizance of the said letter.  The letter talked about how Afzal Guru was forced to take a person to Delhi and also how Davinder Singh and his deputy Shanty Singh had tortured him in police custody.

In an interview to Parvaiz Bhukari, quoted by Arundhati Roy in her 13 questions for December 13, Davinder Singh proudly says, “I did interrogate and torture him [Afzal] at my camp for several days. And we never recorded his arrest in the books anywhere. His description of torture at my camp is true. That was the procedure those days and we did pour petrol in his ass and gave him electric shocks. But I could not break him. He did not reveal anything to me despite our hardest possible interrogation. We tortured him enough for Ghazi Baba but he did not break. He looked like a “bhondu” those days, what you call a “chootya” type. And I had a reputation for torture, interrogation, and breaking suspects. If anybody came out of my interrogation clean, nobody would ever touch him again. He would be considered clean for good by the whole department.”

Expressing strong apprehensions about the sinister motive of the controversial cop escorting militants, the party leader asked, “Was it part of yet another covert operation?”

The sudden arrest of Davinder Singh raises more questions than it answers.

“Was he a double agent minting money from both sides? Was he a mole in the police working for a third agency? Was he a hero of the state that used him for overt and covert operations? Who were his senior handlers and why they haven’t protected him at the time of his arrest? What was the reality behind Afzal’s pointing finger towards him?”

Justice-loving people around the world who are monitoring developments in Kashmir and the people of India need to know answers to all such puzzling questions, said Harpal Singh Cheema and demanded an impartial and transparent probe into the entire role of Davinder Singh as an officer in charge of counter-insurgency operations.

Barely a few days back, he was part of a photo-op at the Srinagar airport receiving envoys of 18 foreign missions on a state-guided tour of the valley. Can there be a bigger compromise than this on the security of diplomats?