Punjab: No sacrilege in Malerkotla incident, says police

Malerkotla (Punjab) [India], May 13 (ANI): The alleged sacrilege case of Guru Granth Sahib has been solved and the incident was caused by an accidental fire, said police on Monday.
According to a Punjab police official, "The investigation had revealed that the fire broke out accidentally due to overheating of a wall fan inside the Gurdwara in Hathoa village."
"The fan caught fire, which in turn set aflame the orange "parna" with which the wall fan had been tied to the Palki Sahib pillar...Both the fan and the "parna" fell on the carpet that caused the fire to spread to the book of Guru Granth Sahib," the police official added.
The police official further said, "The alleged sacrilege incident was reported by a 'Granthi' Joga Singh who had tried to cover up the incident with the story of sacrilege for fear of being blamed of negligence and losing his job."
"Singh confessed to having cooked up the Darbar Hall break-in story when confronted with the forensic and circumstantial evidence. He told the investigators that he was afraid of being blamed for negligence by the villagers and of being discharged from service by the gurdwara management committee," added the police official.
The case was solved by the concerted efforts of fire forensic experts from Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Sangrur, and the findings were also corroborated by an expert team from Mumbai, led by Gopal Relkar, who was flown in today by the Punjab Police.
Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh lauded the collaborative efforts of these teams, under the guidance of SSP Sangrur, Sandeep Garg, and IG Patiala, AS Rai, with DGP Dinkar Gupta, also monitoring the investigations and assessing the situation on the spot. (ANI)