Chandigarh:
Leaders of the ruling SAD-BJP alliance and the opposition were attending an all party meeting convened by Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Tuesday to focus on restoring peace in the state, which has been shattered in the wake of the killing of a sect head in Vienna.
Besides the leaders of the SAD-BJP alliance and the Congress, the meeting was being attended by representatives of the CPI, the CPM and the BSP.
Besides Badal, those present at the meeting included, SAD President Sukhbir Singh Badal, who is also the Deputy Chief Minister, BJP Punjab President Rajinder Bhandari, Punjab Congress President Lal Singh, CPI Secretary Joginder Dayal, CPMs Charan Singh Virdi and BSP Secretary Avtar Singh Karimpuri.
The others present were, former Chief Minister and Leader of Congress Legislature Party (CLP) Rajinder Kaur Bhattal, Daljit Cheema and Prem Singh Chandumajra (SAD), former Minister Balramji Dass Tandon, Local Bodies Minister Manoranjan Kalia and Medical Education Minister Tikshan Sud (BJP).
Three persons were killed at different places in Jalandhar district in the widespread violence and arson since Monday after the head of the Jalandhar based Dera Sachkhand Ballan and his associate were attacked in a Gurdwara at Vienna in Austria on Sunday.
The all party meeting commenced with Badal leading those present in observing two minute silence as a mark of respect to Sant Ramanand who died following the murderous attack.
The Chief Minister moved a resolution for safeguarding what he described as the hard earned atmosphere of peace in Punjab.
The resolution proposed exemplary punishment to those guilty for the incident at Vienna resulting in widespread violence and arson in the state.
While Dera head Sant Niranjan Dass was injured, his associate Sant Ramanand succumbed to bullet injuries in a hospital triggering the violence, including blockade of road and rail traffic, Bandh by commercial and establishments in the state leading to imposition of curfew in four towns of Jalandhar, Phagwara, Hoshiarpur and Ludhiana.
The rift within the Sikh community is a result of upper caste objecting to the followers of the Dera, mostly belonging to the backward classes, paying obeisance to their spiritual head in the presence of the Guru Granth Sahab.