Damning SIT report puts role of cops, judges under scanner

’84 riots Recommendations accepted, will act accordingly, Centre tells SC

New Delhi, January 15

The Union Government today told the Supreme Court they have accepted the recommendations of a special investigation team (SIT), headed by retired Delhi High Court judge Justice SN Dhingra, which has probed 186 cases of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, and they will take appropriate action as per the laws.

In its scathing report on the way the riots cases were handled by the police, administration and even judiciary, the SIT said there was no intention of punishing the culprits and that acquittals were “handed over by judges” to the accused in a “routine manner”.

The report has said “whole efforts” of police and administration “seem to have been to hush up the criminal cases concerning riots”. The cases were registered to give “clean chit” to certain persons, it said.

The report, which was submitted in the apex court, dealt with 186 anti-Sikh riots cases referred to the SIT which was set up by the top court on January 11, 2018, to supervise further probe into these cases in which closure reports were filed earlier.

It said the basic reason for these crimes remaining unpunished and culprits getting scot-free was lack of interest shown by the police and the authorities in handling these cases as per law or to proceed with the intention of punishing those involved.

A Bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde was informed by senior advocate RS Suri, appearing for the petitioner, that the SIT report is damning for police officials and they would file application seeking action against the cops who were allegedly involved in the ghastly crime.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, told the Bench that they had accepted the recommendations made in the report and would take appropriate steps.

“We have accepted the recommendations and we will act accordingly as per law. Lot of steps are required to be taken and it will be taken,” Mehta told the Bench, also comprising Justices BR Gavai and Surya Kant.

During the hearing, Suri referred to the SIT report and said the “undercurrent is that police officials can’t go scot-free for the things which had happened”.

“The report suggests that some action should be taken against police officials as they were in connivance. These police officials cannot go scot-free. We will file a response to the report,” Suri told the Bench and added he would also file an application seeking action against police officials.

The Bench was informed by Mehta that the records of these cases were kept in the apex court registry and these should be returned to the CBI so that further proceedings could go on. The Bench directed that the records be given to the Ministry of Home Affairs.

The SIT, also comprising retired IPS officer Rajdeep Singh and serving IPS officer Abhishek Dular, was set up by the apex court on Janaury 11, 2018, to supervise further investigation into 186 cases in which closure reports were filed earlier.

The SIT presently has only two members as Singh had declined to be part of the team on personal grounds.

In March last year, the top court had granted two more months to the SIT to complete its probe into 186 riot cases after the SIT informed it that more than 50 per cent of work was done and it wanted two more months to complete the investigation.

Large-scale riots targeting members of the Sikh community had broken out in the national capital in the aftermath of the assassination of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her two Sikh security guards on the morning of October 31, 1984. The violence had claimed 2,733 lives in Delhi alone. — PTI

Bq

SC-appointed team findings

On police

BQ: “The whole efforts of the police and the administration seem to have been to hush up the criminal cases concerning riots”

* FIRs not registered incident-wise or crime-wise and instead, several complaints clubbed in one FIR

* One such FIR had complaints regarding 498 incidents and only one investigating officer was assigned to the case.

* Police didn’t preserve forensic evidence for identification of bodies at a later stage

* Evidence of involvement of then SHO of Kalyan Puri police station Survir Singh Tyagi in a conspiracy with rioters

Recommendation: Case be referred to riots cell of Delhi Police for action

On trial courts

BQ: “None of the judgments show judges were alive to the situation of riots and to the fact that for delay in lodging FIRs, victims were not responsible”

* Courts proceeded with trial of several crimes of rioting, murders, arson, looting having taken place at different locations, times and dates together

* No order of separation of trial incident-wise or crime-wise by trial judges despite a provision in the law

* Acquittals handed over by judges to accused of 1984 riots in a ‘routine manner’

* Due to protracted trial, victims and witnesses were so tired of coming to the courts time and again that most of them had given up

Recommendation: Explore possibility of filing appeals, along with application for condonation of delay, against the trial court orders of acquittals in some cases