The Nanavati Report - a brief history

There's a place in New Delhi called Tilak Vihar Colony. That's where the Sikh widows live.

The Sikhs wanted political autonomy in India. Indira Gandhi was assassinated in 1984 by Sikh extremists because of her controversial decision to send troops into the Golden Temple. She made this decision because Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his followers had taken over the temple and stockpiled guns, rifles, antitank missiles, rocket launchers, hand grenades and mortars. The encounter ended in slaughter - 259 Sikhs and 59 soldiers were killed, an additional 90 Sikhs and 110 soldiers were wounded. Unofficial figures placed the dead at more than a thousand. There was a 24-hour curfew in Punjab. Sikh extremists surfaced all over India and the world - attacking Amritsar, Rajasthan, Bombay, New Delhi, Vancouver and other places. Security was stepped up in Indian missions in the US, Canada, Britain, West Germany, The Netherlands and Denmark, where there are significant Sikh populations. Then the Akali Dal Party announced that it would begin to block grain shipments to the rest of India from Punjab, thereby cutting of 65% of the nation's crucial grain reserves and causing widespread famine.

Three days before the attack, Indira Gandhi appealed to the Sikhs to end their agitation. She had agreed to giving them religious autonomy and to amend the constitution to distinguish Sikhs from Hindus but if she gave in to the demand for political autonomy, there would be a Hindu backlash.

So government troops stormed the Golden Temple. Many were killed. Sikh bodyguards assassinated the Prime Minster. Hindus retaliated by brutally murdering the Sikh. One favourite pastime of most Indian people is to drench others in oil and set them on fire. Put tires around their neck and set them on fire. Lock them in their houses and set them on fire.

So now they have the Nanavati Report. Which is an investigation into the anti-Sikh riots in Delhi in 1984. 21 years ago. It took the government 21 years to come up with an investigation report for the targeted murder of two thousand people in the nation's capital. The commission that produced this report is the 9th such commission to probe the 1984 riots and was set up in 1999.

21 years have passed. That's a lifetime some never had. Somebody must have turned that crowd into a mob. And they couldn't find them in 21 years?

So Union Minister Jagdish Tytler and Congress parliamentarian Sajjan Kumar are among those named in the GT Nanavati Commission report on the 1984 anti-Sikh riots for instigating mobs to avenge then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination by her Sikh bodyguards. However, the Government has let all Congress leaders off the hook. Because the commission report says there is a high probablity that Tytler and others had a hand in the riots and the Government says that it cannot prosecute on the basis of probablity alone.

The others named in the report were Lieutenant Governor PG Gavai, the then police commissioner SC Tandon and Congress MP Dharam Dass Shastri. Shastri died somewhere along the way these past 21 years. The Government will not take action on the others.

So, in conclusion, the commission's efforts came to nothing and the Government's action taken report was totally useless.

Waiting 21 years for justice. Is there a statute of limitations on pain?