38 yrs on, 4 anti-Sikh riots suspects held in Kanpur
KANPUR: A special investigation team constituted on the apex court’s orders to investigate the 1984 anti-Sikh riots has arrested four suspects from Kanpur Nagar district in Uttar Pradesh.
Deputy inspector general of police Balendu Bhushan Singh, who heads the SIT, said all the suspects have been sent to jail. They have been identified as Vijay Narayan Singh, Yogendra Singh, Saifullah, and Abdul Rahman, all aged around 65 and residents of Ghatampur area from where they were apprehended following three years of probe.
Singh said the four men were part of a mob that came in a truck and set a house on fire at Nirala Nagar on November 1,1984.
Three people were burnt alive while one person was thrown off the roof of the house, according to the FIR lodged in the case.
The riots that broke out in Kanpur following Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s assassination by her Sikh bodyguards had led to 127 casualties.
The Centre had constituted the SIT in February 2019 to
reinvestigate heinous incidents in which police had submitted closure reports.
The move came after Sikh bodies moved the Supreme Court seeking justice.
The SIT, which initially got six months to complete the probe, has been given several extensions. It has so far investigated 20 FIRs and identified 74 suspects after approaching witnesses
and complainants settled in Delhi, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Sardar Mokam Singh, former head of Gurdwara Banno Sahib, said the struggle of more than three decades has yielded results. “We welcome these arrests; this is the victory of the Constitution. The Sikhs do not want any compensation, but only punishment to all the accused.”