High time, indeed

The Supreme Court has yet again affirmed the need for closure for the victims of the 1984 anti-Sikh violence in Delhi. From the time of the horrific event till now, not a single major instigator of the violence that claimed hundreds of lives and shattered thousands has been convicted. The names of various Congress leaders, including Sajjan Kumar, Jagdish Tytler and HKL Bhagat, have done the rounds. 

The apex court has issued a notice to Sajjan Kumar to cooperate with the Special Investigation Team probe. While doing so, it observed that it was “high time” the cases connected with the anti-Sikh riots were tried and completed. The court was responding to an SIT challenge against the grant of anticipatory bail to him by the Delhi High Court.  In 2013, the court’s dismissal of one of the cases against him had been met with shouts of dismay from the people present there.

Riot victims in particular, and the Sikh community in general, have been looking in vain for justice after the mass killings in Delhi and other cities. The psychological scar that the event left has not healed even after the passage of over three decades. Now that Sajjan Kumar has been directed to cooperate with the SIT, would it be too much to hope for a speedy conclusion of the investigation? Many of the victims who were prime witnesses have died. The intervening decades have served to erode much of the evidence, scanty as it was. This was largely because the police at the time did not gather any evidence. In fact, there are documented cases of coverup and refusal to file complaints of victims. Those who were children then, now have children of their own. It is for the sake of the future generations that those who planned and executed the mass killings are brought to book. Indeed, justice should not only be done, but also it has to be seen to be done. The apex court’s decision and its observations are crucial steps in the right direction.