Jagdish Tytler named AICC delegate, BJP fires 'Nafrat ki dukan' salvo

Tribune News Service

Aditi Tandon

New Delhi, February 20

The BJP on Monday questioned the Congress for electing Jagdish Tytler, whose name was part of the Nanavati Commission report on 1984 anti-Sikh riots, as an AICC delegate who will attend the upcoming Congress Plenary at Raipur.

“This is Congress Party’s shop of hatred (nafrat ki dukan).The leader who spread maximum hatred at the height of anti-Sikh riots has been made an AICC delegate. It would not be wrong to say that such leaders form the spinal cord of the Congress,” BJP spokesperson Gauvan Bhatia said.

He said Tytler was also part of the Congress leaders who oversaw arrangements when Rahul Gandhi’s “Bharat Todo Yatra” arrived in Delhi.

“This only shows Rahul Gandhi and Jagdish Tytler are two bodies, but one soul,” Bhatia said.

AICC delegates will be among 1,500 leaders to attend the AICC plenary in Raipur between February 24 and 26.

Tytler is the second top Congress leader suspected for his role in 1984 riots after Sajjan Kumar, who stands convicted for life and is serving jail time for his involvement in the riots.

In the Tytler case, the CBI had filed three closure reports in 2007, 2009 and 2014.

But Delhi’s Karkardooma courts rejected the CBI closure report on December 4, 2015, on the protest petition by Lakhwinder Kaur, who lost her husband in the Gurdwara Pul Bangash attack.

The court asked the CBI to continue its probe.

Earlier, CBI had reopened three cases of anti-Sikh riots on the orders of Nanavati Commission in 2005. These were – Delhi Cantonment case in which Sajjan Kumar has been convicted today; Sultanpuri killings in which witness Cham Kaur recently identified Sajjan Kumar; Bara Hindu Rao killings in which former Congress MP Jagdish Tytler is accused and the case is underway.

In October 2021 Congress chief Sonia Gandhi had appointed Jagdish Tytler, a suspect in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, as one of the 37 permanent invitees to the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee. Tytler has been named alongside leaders like former Delhi Congress chief JP Agarwal, former AICC general Secretary organisation Janardan Dwivedi and former ministers Kapil Sibal, Ajay Maken and Krishna Tirath.