A loud explosion was reported outside the Jalandhar residence of Former Punjab Minister and BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia in the early hours of Tuesday. Kalia was present inside his house when the blast took off, fortunately he escaped unharmed in the explosion. The police are currently probing whether it was a grenade attack or something else. The security forces are analysing CCTV footage and examining the site to identify the perpetrator behind this explosion.
As per the Police officials, a suspected grenade exploded in front of the gate of Kalia’s residence at around 1 am. A side door near the entrance of his house was damaged in the explosion.
Kalia’s house is located just 100 metres away from the police station. Within minutes of the blast, police personnel along with forensic teams rushed to the spot.
As per the CCTV footage accessed by the police, a suspect arrived near Kalia’s residence in an e-rickshaw and was seen allegedly hurling an unidentified object before fleeing from the scene in the same vehicle. The suspect first passed his residence, then took a U-turn to hurl an explosive.
Speaking to reports following the incident, senior BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia stated that he woke up to the sound of the blast, initially thinking it was a transformer explosion. He then assumed it was the sound of thunder, before someone knocked on his door and informed him it was a blast.
At around around 4:30 am, senior police official Dhanpreet Kaur told reporters present at the crime scene, “Late at night, the police control room received information that an explosion had occurred at the residence of former minister Manoranjan Kalia. Upon receiving the information, police and forensic teams reached the spot and collected samples. An FIR has been registered, and further action has been initiated.”
Tragically, this is not the first such incident of suspected grenade blast in Punjab, under the current Bhagwant Mann-led AAP government. A series of such incidents in the past, have raised serious questions over the law and order affairs of the state.
Ever since the AAP government took charge, the state has witnessed the rampage of Khalistani radicals like Waris Punjab De Chief, Amritpal Singh, who is currently behind bars, rocket launcher attack on Police station, murder of Shiv Sena leader, Siddhu Moosewala murder following the controversial decision of the AAP government to withdraw the security of several prominent persons in the state, the rampant cases of drugs among others. Strikingly, Khalistani group Babbar Khalsa International just yesterday claimed that it carried out a rocket launcher attack at a police station, but the Police have denied such attack.
The security forces, last month, arrested four persons, including a woman for their alleged involvement in hurling a grenade at the house of a Jalandhar-based YouTuber. The prime accused in this case, was identified as Amritpreet Singh. He suffered a bullet injury during an encounter near Chuharwali village.
In another incident, two masked men threw explosives outside Thakur Dwara Temple in Amritsar’s Khandwala area. While no one was hurt in the attack, the explosion damaged walls and shattered window panes of the temple.
Furthermore, around a dozen explosions outside police installations or ones targeting the house of Police officials have been reported in Punjab between November 2024 and February 2025.
As per reports, former Punjab Police SP Jasjit Singh Chahal was the target in the most prominent case of them all – the Chandigarh grenade blast case. The blast took place in September last year.
