Days after a private news channel aired a video interview with jailed gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, Punjab’s officiating Director General of Police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav on Thursday said it was not conducted from the high-security Bathinda jail or any other jail in the state.

Addressing a press conference at the police headquarters in Chandigarh, Yadav said it was impossible to conduct the interview from the Bathinda jail where the gangster is currently lodged.

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The DGP said the interview is a deep-rooted conspiracy to cause trouble in Punjab as use of mobile phones or the internet in the high-security zone was impossible.

“Bishnoi was brought to the Central Jail in Bathinda on 8 March and was lodged in an isolated cell in the high-security zone after thorough checking. This zone is guarded by a double cordon of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and no mobile phone can be operated from there. No mobile signal is possible from this zone,” he added.

Yadav said the interview seems to have been conducted much earlier as Bishnoi has a long beard in the interview but when he was brought to Bathinda jail earlier this month and was medically examined, he had a short beard.  He said the T-shirt worn by the gangster during the interview is also not there with him at present.

In an hour-long interview supposedly given from inside the prison,  Bishnoi admitted to his role as a key conspirator in the Sidhu Moosewala killing. The gangster is heard saying that he had arranged everything according to the plan, which was hatched along with another gangster Satinderjit Singh, alias Goldy Brar who is based in Canada.

When the interviewer asked Bishnoi how he managed to procure a phone for the video interview from inside a jail, the gangster said that he knew how to exploit loopholes in the prisons department.

Meanwhile, reacting to the interview, Sidhu Moosewala’s father Balkaur Singh said it was a deep-rooted conspiracy and a bid to defame Sidhu Moosewala ahead of his first barsi. “But such people will never succeed in their designs as Sidhu Moosewala has carved a place in the hearts of the people,” he added.