New Delhi, November 3, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
The Supreme Court on Tuesday deferred until February 2027 the hearing on Jagtar Singh Hawara’s plea seeking transfer from Delhi’s Tihar Jail to a prison in Punjab, after taking note of an Intelligence Bureau (IB) report warning of possible law and order concerns and an impact on the state’s upcoming Assembly elections.
A Bench of Justices M.M. Sundresh and Prasanna B. Varale was informed by Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, appearing for the Centre, that the IB had described Hawara, a convict in the 1995 assassination of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh, as a high-risk prisoner and expressed reservations about his transfer to Punjab.
The agency reportedly warned that the move could have significant repercussions for the state’s law and order situation and political atmosphere ahead of the Assembly elections scheduled for early next year. The Bench said the report’s contents were serious and expressed concern over the possible consequences of passing an order at this stage.
Senior advocate S. Muralidhar, appearing for Hawara, opposed the Centre’s position that Tihar Jail was better equipped to house high-security prisoners. He also urged the court to allow Hawara to meet his ailing mother. The Bench observed that it would ordinarily have no objection to permitting jail visits but described the IB report as “very damning” in the prevailing circumstances.
Muralidhar suggested that the matter be taken up after three months. Accepting the suggestion, the court deferred the hearing to the week commencing February 22, 2027.
The matter was last heard on October 13, when the Centre said it needed inputs from the IB before deciding on the proposed transfer. The court had then asked the Centre to obtain the agency’s views on whether shifting Hawara to a Punjab prison would be prudent.
Hawara was convicted in connection with the August 1995 assassination of Beant Singh, who was killed along with 16 others in a bomb blast outside the Civil Secretariat in Chandigarh. A trial court convicted Hawara and other accused in July 2007 and initially sentenced him to death. The Punjab and Haryana High Court commuted his sentence to life imprisonment in December 2010.
Separately, the Punjab government has been seeking temporary parole for Hawara on humanitarian grounds to enable him to meet his elderly and ailing mother. Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann had approached Governor Gulab Chand Kataria seeking his intervention for 10-day parole, assuring that the state government would take responsibility for maintaining law and order during any such visit.
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