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Justice delayed, denied

Don’t spare officials who wronged victims of 1984 riots

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The rioters and their abettors weren’t the only villains. The police, the administration, the judiciary — it’s a monstrous nexus that denied justice to hundreds of victims of the 1984 riots. This criminal complicity has been established in a report submitted by the special investigation team (SIT) headed by Justice SN Dhingra, a retired Delhi High Court judge. The SIT found that FIRs were deliberately not registered by the police incident-wise or crime-wise. One FIR had complaints regarding as many as 498 incidents; the improbable task of investigating the entire case was assigned to just one officer — with the obvious objective of helping the accused go scot-free. In another case, the police filed a challan with regard to the murder of 56 persons, but the trial court framed charges only in respect of the killing of five. Did nobody kill the 51 others? The report also points out that judges did not pay heed to the fact that the victims were not responsible for the delay in lodging FIRs and recording statements of witnesses.

The onus is now on the Centre to act as per the recommendations of the probe team and penalise officials responsible for gross miscarriage of justice. This glimmer of hope for many victims should not prove to be yet another false dawn. The SIT’s findings can also go a long way in acting as a deterrent to excesses committed by the law-enforcers. The most recent victims of abuse of authority were those gunned down by the UP Police during the anti-CAA protests. The SIT has turned the spotlight on the use of cops and other officials as marionettes who are empowered or disempowered by the State for its vested interests.

Albert Einstein once said: ‘The Nuremberg trial of the German war criminals was tacitly based on the recognition of the principle: criminal actions cannot be excused (even) if committed on government orders; conscience supersedes the authority of the law of the State.’ The 1984 riots are a blot on the nation’s conscience. Only justice, even if it’s rather late in the day, can pave the way for closure.

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