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He is dead, but his words are
enough to hang Sajjan Kumar
 Chandigarh:
For Gurcharan Singh, left to live a hell like existence after being
thrown alive in a burning truck in the 1984 carnage, death came
torturously slow and painfully, 25 years later. He is yet to get
justice, even in death.
However, his
statement given to the CBI, a few months before his death is now a
matter of record and categorically names Sajjan Kuamr as the person
responsible for instigating a mob to kill Sikhs and loot and burn
their property.
“I saw Sajjan
Kumar addressing a group of people, outside the house of Kripa Ram
on the morning of November 1 at
8 am.
I heard him saying, 'Maine
aapki suraksha ka pura prabandh kar liya hai, ab koi Sikh bachne na
paye. Sabko maar do kayoke inho ne hamaari maa Indira ko maara hai,
Inn kutton ko saza milni chahiye.' Sajjan Kumar also asked his men
to distribute lathis and iron rods to the mob and asked the kerosene
depot holder to distribute the kerosene to them so that they can
burn Sikhs, their houses and their religious places,” goes the
statement.
The mob attacked
them on Nov 1, burnt their four shops and set their truck on fire.
Gurcharn Singh was flung into the raging inferno of a truck outside
his house in Gulab Bagh, Nawada on Delhi's outskirts. He was rescued
in a badly burnt condition after the mob left. The family lost his
maternal uncle, Santokh Singh, in that inferno. Collecting their two
injured young boys, 17 years old Gurcharan and his younger brother,
Tirlochan Singh, now rendered handicapped, they sought shelter in
Punjab
at Balongi village on
Chandigarh's
outskirts, to live in obscurity.
 Struggling
to make both ends meet, they never appeared before any commission
after they were “let down” by the Janakpuri police station in
Delhi
immediately after the massacres.
Recently, they
even refused to provide information under RTI to their lawyer
Navkiran Singh about the family’s complaint in 1984.
Hope was
rekindled in 2008, when CBI started reinvestigating the cases.
AISSF and Sikh
for Justice (SFJ) helped Gurcharan to record his statement before
the CBI from his bed on March 11, 2008, but a year later, death came
silently, ending his vegetative existence in February 2009. His
family, with the help of fellow victims and human rights
organizations, would now be approaching the HC with a petition to
turn his case into that of a death case and seek compensation
besides demanding Sajjan’s arrest.
More than the
miserable existence, it was the indifferent attitude of authorities
and Sikh leadership which hurt them more. Harvinder Singh Kohli, a
neighbour from Delhi, who was also an eye-witness to the crime,
recalls taking him on a stretcher to meet Delhi Gurdwara Management
committee (DGMC) president Paramjit Singh Sarna, in January last
year.
“After listening
to his story, Sarna took me out of the room and started expressing
suspicion about Gurcharan, saying he did not look like a 40 year old
man at all. Shocked at this insensitivity, I told him how could he
expect a man in vegetative state to grow like any other normal man.
We left the place disgusted and without expecting any help.”
Punjab CM
Prakash Singh Badal also did not fare well as despite his promise of
granting Rs 5 lakh for Gurcharan's treatment in December 2008, no
help came his way, nor was any red-card made. Gurcharan had met him
with great difficulty after traveling to Mohali. When the security
refused permission to meet the CM in the sangat darshan, his
stretcher was kept on the road to protest.
6
January 2010
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