SIT report on 1984 riots complete, handed to Supreme Court in sealed cover

The special investigation team set up on the Supreme Court’s orders to probe 186 cases from the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi has completed its investigation, the Centre told the Supreme Court on Friday.

Pinky Anand, the Centre’s senior law officer, handed over the special team’s report in a sealed cover to the top court and requested that the team headed by a retired high court judge be discharged.

The court has taken the report on record and adjourned the case for two weeks.

The SIT was constituted on the direction of a three-judge bench led by the then Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra in January 2018 on a petition filed by a riot victim Gurlad Singh Kahlon.

The SIT had taken up the probe into more than 190 cases that had been closed by the police.

The SIT, headed by former Delhi high court judge, Justice SN Dhingra, was to have three members. But it was permitted to function with two members after one, retired IPS officer Rajdeep Singh, declined to be a part of the exercise. IPS officer Abhishek Dular was the second member apart from Justice Dhingra.

Appearing for victims, senior counsel HS Phoolka opposed the request to disband the SIT before the court examines the SIT report. He also asked for a copy of the report to be supplied to him.

Additional Solicitor General Pinky Anand said the report is in sealed cover and only for the perusal of the court.

The 1984 anti-Sikh riots broke out after the assassination of Indira Gandhi who was then the Prime Minister of the country. Thousands of people from the Sikh community were killed in the riots with the Delhi being the worst affected city. Some senior politicians, many of them from the Congress party, were accused of inciting violence and fomenting tensions.

In December 2018, the Delhi High Court had convicted former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar for his role in the riots and sentenced him to life imprisonment. His appeal is pending in Supreme Court.