By Somya Panwar
On Wednesday, Delhi’s Rouse Avenue court convicted Sajjan Kumar, former Congress MP, in a case related to the killings of two men during anti-Sikh riots on November 1, 1984. The quantum of the sentence in the aforementioned case will be decided by the argument that will take place on February 18.
Allegedly, Kumar, who was a former Congress MP back then for outer Delhi, led a mob that burnt two Sikh men alive—Jaswant Singh and his son Tarunpreet Singh. Acting on his directions, the mob destroyed and looted their houses, argued the Special Investigation Team (STI), which was probing the case. Manish Rawat, an additional public prosecutor, represented SIT in the court.
After a long delay of seven years, the wife and the mother of the victims claimed to be eyewitnesses of the crime, and hence, their testimonies are unreliable, argued the Kumars’ counsel—Anil Kumar Sharma, Anuj Sharma, and Apporav Sharma. Senior advocates H.S. Phoolka, advocate Kamna Vohra, and Gurbaksh Singh were representing the complainants.
After then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was murdered by two Sikh bodyguards in retaliation for her order to the Indian army to storm the Golden Temple, Amritsar, in June 1984 in order to flush out the militants, riots broke out in Delhi and other parts of the nation.
In 1991 the FIR in this case was filed on the basis of an affidavit dated September 9, 1985, which was presented to Justice Rangnath Mishra Commission, which was appointed by then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1985 by the complainant. The affidavit was draughted to enquire into the organised violence that took place in Delhi.
Special Judge M. K. Nagpal of the Rose Avenue Court on December 4, 2021, framed charges against the accused for the following offences: murder, rioting with a deadly weapon, attempting to culpable homicide along with others, and unlawful assembly.
Currently lodged in Tihar Jail, Kumar has been serving a life sentence since 2018, which was handed down by the Delhi High Court in a case related to the burning down of a gurudwara in Raj Nagar Part II and the killing of five Sikhs at Raj Nagar Part I in Palam Colony on November 1-2, 1984.
Kumar has four appeals pending, one in the Rouse Avenue court, two in High Court, and one against his conviction in the Supreme Court, respectively.