Ambala Highway Blockade: What Really Happened Before the Lathi-Charge
Ambala Highway Blockade: HSGMC chief Jhinda and Ambala SP Shekhawat have different stories to tell on what happened at the Aug 13 Ambala highway blockade. Who broke the truce: police or protesters?
North Desk Correspondent
Ambala, August 14
For nearly eight hours on Thursday, the Amritsar-Delhi National Highway near Gurdwara Panjokhra Sahib in Ambala Cantonment sat jammed, as roughly 1,500-1,600 members of the Sikh community held their ground demanding action against a man most residents had never heard of a week earlier — Gursimran Singh Mand, the self-styled national president of the “International Anti-Khalistani Terrorist Front” (IAKTF).
By nightfall, tear gas hung over the highway, police had cane-charged the crowd, six-odd policemen were being treated for injuries — one of them, DSP Virender Sharma, for a hand that Ambala SP Ajit Singh Shekhawat says was struck by a farsa and nearly severed — and Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (HSGMC) president Jagdish Singh Jhinda was among the injured protesters.
Haryana DGP Ajay Singhal visited the injured policemen in hospital and issued a statement framing the day as police restoring law and order against an unprovoked attack. However, there are conflicting report on what happened in the minutes just before the lathi-charge began.
How it started: the Mand assault of August 7
The chain of events begins a week earlier. On August 7, during Gurpurab celebrations at Gurdwara Panjokhra Sahib, Mand arrived at the complex to “pay obeisance”. He says he was not allowed inside, sat in his car to wait, and was then set upon by a crowd who struck him and his son with swords and clubs and vandalised his vehicle. He told reporters from his hospital bed that he was targeted for “speaking in favour of the prime minister, and against Khalistan,” and that the crowd demanded he raise slogans against the PM and RSS and call for the release of Amritpal Singh.
A different account, attributed to local and Akali sources, says Mand got into a heated altercation with the sangat and allegedly brandished weapons and used abusive language, which is what triggered the mob response. Ambala SP Ajit Singh Shekhawat, at the time, said the reason for the incident was “yet to be ascertained.”
Two of Mand’s sub-inspector escorts were also hurt trying to protect him. Mand, who holds Y-category central security cover, filed a police complaint invoking attempt-to-murder and rioting charges against unidentified persons. Two Sikh youths were subsequently detained in connection with the assault. The court sent them to judicial custody.
Ambala Highway Blockade: The ten days in between
Ambala Highway Blockade: The community’s anger did not subside. Sikh leaders including HSGMC’s Jhinda, BKU (Charuni) president Gurnam Singh and BKU (Shaheed Bhagat Singh) president Amarjeet Singh held a dharna outside Panjokhra police station days later, demanding the two detained youths not face charges. They also demanded action against Mand. Police assured the community no innocent person would be implicated.
On August 10, per Jhinda’s account, SP Shekhawat gave a fresh assurance: an FIR against Mand would be registered. That set up the terms for what came next.
August 13: the dharna, the phone call, and the breakdown
With no FIR filed by August 13, the community moved. A crowd gathered at Panjokhra Sahib and marched toward the national highway, removing police barricades along the way, and blocked both carriageways near Jaggi City Centre in Ambala Cantonment. The blockade held for seven to eight hours.
According to Jhinda, a resolution was close: a police officer called to say the road should be opened, and in exchange the promised FIR would be registered and the two youths in judicial custody since the August 7 case would be released within two days. Jhinda says the community agreed, the dharna was about to be called off, and that he had risen to make the announcement ending it. Exactly at that point the police action began, he claims.
SP Shekhawat’s account is different. He says an FIR against Mand was in fact registered, as the community demanded. But he says the protesters then demanded that the two youths, who were in judicial custody, be physically produced at the protest site. Shekhawat says this was legally impossible without a court order, but a section of the crowd turned “adamant” and pushed for a “pacca morcha” rather than accept that explanation. He also claimed that the protesters were armed with axes, spears and other weapons. He says this tested police’s patience who only used “mild force” to clear the dharna.
So, Jhinda maintains police struck first, just ahead of announcement. Shekhawat claims a hardline faction within the crowd provoked the police into action.
What police chief said
Ambala Highway Blockade: Haryana DGP Ajay Singhal’s press statement, issued after his hospital visit to the injured personnel, describes the day as a straightforward law-and-order operation: police “acted with restraint and responsibility” while clearing a highway blockade during which they came under attack. The statement does not name Mand, the IAKTF, the gurdwara, the August 7 assault, the FIR assurance, the two detained youths, or the fact that an HSGMC office-bearer was among the injured. It closes with an appeal to the public to air grievances peacefully and avoid blocking roads.
Ambala Highway Blockade: Ambala Cantonment sits directly on the Punjab-Haryana border, and Gurdwara Panjokhra Sahib draws sangat from both states. The HSGMC’s involvement — a body that operates independently of Punjab’s SGPC but speaks to the same community — means this is not purely a Haryana law-and-order story. The presence of BKU (Charuni) and BKU (Shaheed Bhagat Singh) leaders at the earlier police-station dharna also signals that farm-union networks, not just religious bodies, were tracking this closely well before the highway blockade.
HSGMC has said it will hold its own inquiry into how and why the lathi-charge began.
Akal Takht Jathedar slams police
Akal Takht Sahib Jathedar Giani Kuldip Singh Gargajj has called it an unfortunate incident.
Hitting out at the Haryana Police for the lathi-charge and use of tear gas shells against Sikh protesters in Ambala, he said it was extremely unfortunate that when the talks were on between the Haryana government and the Sikh community, it suddenly attacked them. He described the Haryana Police’s action extremely unfortunate and unjust.
Jathedar Gargajj said several Sikh devotees including HGMC president Jagdish Singh Jhinda were injured in the incident.
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