Faith and fury

The family of Lakhbir Singh, who was allegedly murdered by the Nihangs, wants speedy justice so that his name could be cleared of the sacrilege charge

- PRATUL SHARMA

A POLICEMAN FROM the local intelligence unit stood outside the house of Lakhbir Singh, the dalit Sikh labourer who was allegedly murdered by the Nihangs. The charge is that the quasi-monastic order of Sikh warriors killed him at Singhu border, near Delhi.

Lakhbir was killed for allegedly desecrating the Sarbloh Granth, a Sikh holy book. Lakhbir’s two-room house is in the Mazhabi Sikh cluster in Chima Kalan village, barely five kilometres from the Pakistan border in Punjab’s Tarn Taran district. The starkness of his room was unnerving. It was sparsely furnished, with just old pictures of Sikh gurus on the walls. Lakhbir’s sister, Raj Kaur, had gone to the bank, so her room was locked.

Kaur returned an hour later, along with her 11-year-old daughter. She is yet to recover from the shock of her brother’s death. “On October 10, Lakhbir asked me for some money so that he could go to a mandi in the nearby Chabal Kalan village to find work,”said Kaur. “I gave him ₹50. It was only six days later that I came to know what happened to him, when boys in the neighbourhood saw videos on their mobile phones.”

Kaur, who works at the village sarpanch’s farm, had repeatedly recounted her final meeting with Lakhbir to the police and other visitors. “I don’t know how he ended up at the Singhu border, or with whom he went, or whether he was lured by someone. But I am sure he cannot be involved in sacrilege,”she said.