Missing Sajjan file lands cop in soup
Missing Sajjan file lands cop in soup: India Today - Latest Breaking News from India, World, Business, Cricket, Sports, Bollywood.
By a quirk of fate, a two decade-old criminal case against Congress leader Sajjan Kumar has been unearthed.
The chargesheet in the case is, however, missing. Taking cognisance of this, additional sessions judge at Rohini court, V. K. Goyal, has summoned senior Delhi Police officer Rajiv Ranjan to explain the circumstances under which the chargesheet filed against Kumar in the 1984 anti-Sikh riot case disappeared.
Ranjan is currently posted in the Prime Minister's security wing.
Three persons were killed near Nangloi during the riots following the assassination of the then prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1984.
Kumar, then a member of Parliament, was charged in this case under various sections, including rioting, robbery and murder.
He was the only accused in the case (FIR no. 67/ 87) but was neither summoned nor arrested because, according to the Delhi Police, that would have created a law and order problem.
Mail Today had on April 7 reported about the missing chargesheet against Kumar. It was a chance discovery made by B. S. Joon, director of prosecution, during the inspection of documents.
On April 1, Joon filed an application before the Rohini court, requesting to ascertain the status of the missing chargesheet.
Joon's application said: "Keeping in view the facts and circumstances of the case and in the interest of the justice, the status of file of case FIR no. 67/ 87 of PS (police station) Nangloi may be ascertained and the accused mentioned therein may be prosecuted in accordance with the provisions of law, by summoning the witnesses, cited in the said case." He stated that the non- prosecution of the accused ( Kumar) in these circumstances would amount to " miscarriage of justice". According to Joon, the Delhi Police had clubbed the case against Kumar with another one (FIR no. 418/ 91).
This fact came to light only during the inspection of documents pertaining to the second case. The chargesheet against Kumar was never submitted in the court, Joon alleged.
In his statement recorded in connection with the other case ( no. 418/ 91) in 2007, Ranjan had said "the chargesheet in case FIR no. 67/ 87 had already been filed and both the cases clubbed". There was a joint trial, but Kumar was never questioned and the case was buried.
"The court will now question him (Ranjan) about the chargesheet since he had given a written statement," Joon said.
Senior advocate H. S. Phoolka, who represents the 1984 riots victims, has demanded a highlevel inquiry into this.
"Sajjan Kumar's name was there in the first FIR but struck down in the chargesheet and when his name figured in the chargesheet pertaining to the second FIR, the files went missing," he said. This proves that the police are trying to protect Sajjan Kumar, Phoolka said.
The Justice G. T. Nanavati Commission, which probed the 1984 anti- Sikh riots, had recommended that all the seven cases against Kumar be reinvestigated.
On the role of Congress leaders in the riots, the commission stated that " there is credible material" against Kumar and another Congress leader, Balwan Khokar.
The CBI has already filed chargesheets in two different cases against Kumar and others under various sections, including Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, and the trials in these cases are on.
