Govt. appointed SIT all set to reopen 75 cases of 1984 anti-sikh riots

TIL Desk New Delhi/ Government appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) will soon reopen 75 cases related with 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi. Apparently, Centre has decided to re-investigate the case in the wake of mounting pressure from Sikh community ahead of next year Punjab Assembly election. As per the norm, the SIT will issue advertisements regarding these cases and ask the victims and witnesses to join the probe.

In past, AAP also trained guns on BJP government for not doing enough for 1984 victims. Recently, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had also written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding the same. He had termed the SIT an “eyewash”. “The SIT has failed to reopen even a single case. I urge you to either get your SIT to do something or kindly wind up this SIT and allow the Delhi government to set up an SIT for proper investigation and get justice for the victims,” Mr Kejriwal wrote in the missive.

A total of 3,325 people were killed in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and other states in the riots after Indira Gandhi was shot dead by her Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984. Delhi alone accounted for 2,733 deaths. Several Congress leaders, including the likes of late HKL Bhagat, Sajjan Kumar and Jagdish Tytler, were accused of involvement and complicity in the anti-Sikh carnage. In May, the Centre approved increased compensation to 1,020 families hit by the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and which migrated to Punjab from different parts of the country.