1984 riots case: Sajjan claims key witness did not name him initially

Facing trial in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, veteran Congress leader Sajjan Kumar on Tuesday told a Delhi court that his name did not figure in the statement made by a key witness before a judicial commission 27 years ago.

Facing trial in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, veteran Congress leader Sajjan Kumar on Tuesday told a Delhi court that his name did not figure in the statement made by a key witness before a judicial commission 27 years ago.

HT Image

During final arguments in the case before district judge JR Aryan, Kumar's counsel IU Khan said, "Kumar is named as the main accused in this case, but Jagdish Kaur did not name him before the Ranganath Mishra Commission in 1985. Kumar's name surfaced for the first time in 2000, before the Nanavati Commission."

Kumar is facing trial along with Balwan Khokkar, Kishan Khokkar, Mahender Yadav, Girdhari Lal and Captain Bhagmal for allegedly inciting a mob against the Sikh community in the Delhi Cantonment area.

Both commissions had gone into the sequence of events leading to the anti-Sikh riots after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984. Khan had on Monday claimed that Kumar's political opponents got an opportunity to frame him in a false case by appointing the GT Nanavati Commission in 2000, when the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) was in power in Punjab and the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) at the Centre. "The Nanavati commission was a political move by the SAD," Khan had said.