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Pakistan court denies bail to 3 in Sikh youth’s killing


A Pakistani court on Wednesday rejected the bail applications of three accused allegedly involved in the killing of a Sikh youth in the country’s restive northwestern tribal region.

Parvinder Singh, 25, was shot dead by unknown gunmen weeks before his marriage in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in January this year.

Additional Sessions Judge of a Mardan city court Dr Khursheed Iqbal rejected the applications after prosecution counsel Asfandyar Yusafzai opposed them, saying there are solid evidence against the accused.

The data relating to the foreign remittances made to Prem Kumari, 18, fiancée of Singh among other evidence are available, the counsel said.

Singh’s killing had drawn sharp condemnation from India which demanded exemplary punishment to the perpetrators of the crime.

Prem was arrested for her alleged involvement in plotting the murder.

The police in its initial report stated that Singh and Prem loved each other. After their engagement with their consent, they started preparations for the marriage.

However, Prem befriended a Muslim boy who happened to be the brother of her friend, they said.

Prem called Singh to Mardan where her friends killed him and dumped the body in open fields near Chamakani, a rural area, where police found it on January 5, they said.

Prem’s father is a Hindu and mother is a Sikh. Singh had returned to Pakistan after working in Malaysia for six years.

The murder took place a day after a mob attacked Gurdwara Nankana Sahib where Sikhism founder Guru Nanak Dev was born.

Minorities in the Muslim-majority Pakistan make up some two per cent of the country’s total population.

Pakistan has witnessed violence against religious minorities in the past as al-Qaeda and Taliban-led militants regularly target Christian, Sikhs, Hindus, Ahmadis and Shiite communities in the country.

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Tagged 3, Bail, Court, denies, Killing, Pakistan, Sikh, youths