Punjab AAP MLA Manjinder Lalpura Gets 4-Year Jail Term in 2013 Dalit Woman Molestation Case
A Punjab court has sentenced AAP legislator Manjinder Lalpura from Khadoor Sahib to four years in prison for a shocking 2013 molestation and assault case involving a Dalit woman. This happened when Lalpura worked as a taxi driver, and the court in Tarn Taran convicted him along with 11 others on Wednesday. Police arrested Lalpura and sent him to jail right away, marking him as the fifth AAP MLA in Punjab to face arrest in recent cases.
The case dates back to March 3, 2013, at a wedding hall in Tarn Taran. The victim, a woman from the Scheduled Castes (SC) community, went to the venue with her family for a marriage function. But things turned ugly when she and her relatives clashed with the accused group. Lalpura and others, including five police personnel—Davinder Kumar, Saraj Singh, Ashwani Kumar, Tarsem Singh, and Harjinder Singh—allegedly assaulted her. They beat her with canes, and reports say Lalpura molested her during the attack. The police even used force, ignoring public orders, which sparked massive outrage.
Out of the 12 convicted, seven are now in custody, including Lalpura. One accused has died, and another is already in Tihar Jail. Three others—Gagandeep Singh, Narinderjit Singh, and Gurdeep Raj—escaped immediate arrest and weren’t sent to judicial custody. The court charged them under serious Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections like 354 for outraging a woman’s modesty, 506 for criminal intimidation, 324 for causing hurt with dangerous weapons, 148 for rioting with deadly arms, and others including 323, 270, 188, and 283.
This incident grabbed national attention back then. The Supreme Court took suo motu notice and ordered paramilitary protection for the victim, her cousin Jagjit Singh (an eyewitness), and their family. On March 19, 2013, the Punjab and Haryana High Court slammed the police for their role, transferred seven officers involved, and ensured security for the survivors.
Lalpura won the 2022 Punjab Assembly elections from Khadoor Sahib on an AAP ticket, beating Congress’s Ramanjit Singh Sikki by over 16,000 votes. His conviction comes soon after another AAP MLA, Harmeet Singh Pathanmajra from Sanaur, went on the run over a rape case since September 2. Punjab’s AAP leaders now face growing scrutiny as more cases pile up against their MLAs.
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