'84 riots: CBI claims witness Jasbir is proclaimed offender
CBI on Thursday told before a Delhi court that Jasbir Singh, a witness in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case allegedly involving former Union Minister Jagdish Tytler, was a proclaimed offender and illegally residing in the United States.
CBI on Thursday told before a Delhi court that Jasbir Singh, a witness in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case allegedly involving former Union Minister Jagdish Tytler, was a proclaimed offender and illegally residing in the United States.
"He has been declared a proclaimed offender in the case of making an attack on Darshan Kaur, a woman witness who wanted to depose against Congress leader H K L Bhagat.
"Jasbir Singh absconded in 2004 after filing of the chargesheet in the case which was lodged with IP Estate police station here in 1997. His passport was ordered to be impounded by the authorities and he was residing in the US illegally," CBI prosecutor Sanjay Kumar submitted.
The CBI counsel was arguing before Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Rakesh Pandit on the agency's closure report giving a clean chit to the Congress leader in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case pertaining to the murder of three persons on November one, 1984, following the assassination of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
Kumar read out statements of witnesses like Pala Ram, Sheetal Singh, Rajesh Rani and Bachi Bai, who allegedly claimed before the probe agency that Jasbir was not residing at Jagjit Nagar, contrary to his claim.
CBI counsel's view was strongly opposed by Rebecca M John, counsel for Lakhwinder Kaur who filed an application before the court protesting the closure report against Tytler.
"The probe agency recorded statements of so many persons but failed to examine Satto Singh, father of Jasbir, who is present even now before the court, till date," she submitted.
In order to buttress her arguments, she also produced a copy of a complaint submitted to the then SHO of Seelampur by Satto Singh on November 16, 1984 regarding the killing of the landlord by a mob in which he had mentioned his address at Jagjit Nagar as claimed by Jasbir.
Jabir, in an affidavit, had claimed before the Nanawati Commission that he had heard Tytler on November three, 1984 rebuking his men for "nominal killings" carried out in the riots.