A Delhi court has set aside the CBI closure report exonerating Jagdish Tytler of involvement in the 1984 riots in Delhi. The agency has been asked to examine eye-witnesses and fully investigate their claims. More than 3000 Sikhs were killed in Delhi and other cities. According to the Delhi court, justice has been denied. Now 10 commissions of inquiry have been instituted. Of course, the killings were a reprisal against the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by three Sikh bodyguards. There was a sympathy wave which interfered with the principle of let right be done in the case of the 1984 massacre. The Congress government in power was perhaps slack. The Congress leadership treated the tragedy as one of the saddest hours in history and just that. Three decades have mauled evidence. But the relatives of the victims have neither forgotten nor forgiven. The involvement of Tytler can only be proved in court. But the way his case was conducted previously showed the tortuous process of extracting accountability. Maybe, so did the trial of Satwant Singh, one of Indira Gandhi’s assassins. In 2005, Tytler was said to be very probably complicit in stirring up violence. He was forced to resign from the cabinet. The CBI declared him innocent twice. But the agency has now been asked to act with a greater sense of commitment.
The Delhi riots link up with the tragedy in Bombay in 1993 and in Gujarat in 2002. Political leaders are often involved in communal violence but let off untainted. The public has no trust in the impartial authority of the state. It will not do to gloss over the 2002 riots in Gujarat by bringing up the Delhi riots of 1984 and arrive at a political equation. One hopes the judiciary will try Tytler impartially. One also hopes that it will cut out the unnecessary delay which is about to make the Delhi gang rape case a thing of the past, with repercussions elsewhere.