1984 Anti-Sikh Riots | Ensure Petitions Against Acquittals Are Filed Within 6 Weeks: Supreme Court Tells Delhi Police

The Delhi Police today (February 17) informed the Supreme Court that it would be filing Special Leave Petitions in six cases where the accused in the 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots were acquitted. 

The bench of Justice AS Oka and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan was hearing an Article 32 petition filed by S Gurlad Singh Kahlon in 2016. In this petition, the Court formed a committee led by Justice SN Dhingra.

Justice Dhingra committee, constituted by the Supreme Court in 2018, submitted its report in January 2020 opining that the investigation was derailed in several riot cases and recommended, among others, the filing of appeals against acquittals. Although the Delhi police filed appeals against acquittals, the Delhi High Court dismissed them on delay. 

The bench was informed that before the High Court, 8 appeals were filed challenging the acquittals in the Anti-Sikh Delhi Riots. In 2 such cases, SLP to the Supreme Court was filed. The Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati appearing for the Delhi Police submitted that they would be filling SLPs for the remaining 6 cases also.

Noting the above, the Bench passed the following order :

"SLP will be filed by the State of Delhi in the following 6 cases...considering the fact that this bench is seized of WP 9/2016, the SLP shall be placed before the Honourable Chief Justice of India, seeking administrative directions for tagging those SLPs along with the present writ petition."

"We direct the State of Delhi to ensure that SLP in the aforesaid cases are filed in the maximum period of 6 weeks from today."

The bench also allowed the State to place reliance upon the precedents filed by the petitioner.

Previously, the petitioner's counsel, Senior Advocate HS Phoolka and AOR Amrit Singh Bedi submitted that there was a judgment of Justice Muralidhar of the Delhi High Court which observed that there was a "great cover-up" in the 1984 riots cases and that the State did not prosecute the matters properly. However, this judgment was not placed before the Delhi High Court in the appeals, he stated.

The petitioner's counsel submitted that in one murder case, of the 56 accused, charges were framed only against 5 and the other 51 were discharged. The petitioner submitted that the State must frame charges against the other accused. In many cases of murder and gang rapes, no trial took place due to closure reports filed by the agencies, the petitioner said.

Today, Bedi along with Sr Advocate HS Phoolka submitted Justice Muralidhar's judgment before the bench and highlighted major lapses that allegedly occurred right from the stage of the trial. He submitted : 

"These are the judgements from the High Court which shows how the investigation and the prosecution is hand in glove with the accused my lords." 

"These are not normal cases, with the view to shield the accused, the intentionally, first of all, the trials were sham trials, investigations were sham trials, and how the prosecutors themselves spoiled the cases to shield the accused. Mylords, this is the High Court's finding." 

The petitioners informed the bench that initially the Court issued notice in the present matter to look into 186  cases of crimes committed in the riots as stated by the Committee. However, the petitioners highlighted that apart from those 183/186 cases, there were several other criminal cases which they wished to bring before the Court, if the bench agreed to not confine to only those instances referred by the Committee. 

"Once my lords may take a decision of whether we are only restricting it to 183/186 cases , then we can file the other cases" the counsel submitted. 

On the issue of delayed disposal of the Suo Motu criminal revision petitions by the Delhi High Court in 4 cases, the bench directed the Registrar General of the High Court to submit a status report on the same. 

The Court also dissolved the Dhingra Committee while acknowledging the efforts of Justice Dhingra. It recorded " We compliment the efforts taken by Justice Dhingra and the role played him". 

Case Details : S Gurlad Singh Kahlon v Union of India | WP (Crl) 9/2016