New Delhi: The prosecution on Tuesday sought the death penalty for former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar in a murder case related to the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, calling it a “rarest of rare” crime.
Special judge Kaveri Baweja was informed of the contention in a written submission filed by the prosecution.
The minimum punishment for murder is life imprisonment.
The judge deferred the matter to February 21 after Kumar’s counsel sought time to argue the matter, saying lawyers were abstaining from work on Tuesday in protest of the Advocate Amendment Bill, 2025.
The complainant’s counsel senior advocate HS Phoolka supported the prosecution’s demand for death penalty and sought time to argue.
Kumar is currently lodged in Tihar jail.
Jaswant Singh and his son Tarundeep Singh were killed on November 1, 1984.
Though Punjabi Bagh Police Station registered the case, a special investigation team later took over the investigation.
On December 16, 2021, the court framed charges against Kumar, finding a “prima facie” case against him.
The prosecution has alleged a huge mob, armed with deadly weapons, resorted to large-scale looting, arson and destruction of properties of Sikhs to avenge the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
The mob attacked the house of the complainant, who is Jaswant’s wife, killing the men aside from looting articles and setting their house ablaze, the prosecution claimed.
According to a report of the Nanavati Commission, constituted to probe the violence and its aftermath, there were 587 FIRs filed in Delhi in relation to the riots that saw the killings of 2,733 people. Of the total, about 240 FIRs were closed by police as “untraced” and 250 cases resulted in acquittal.
Only 28 cases of 587 FIRs resulted in convictions, in which about 400 persons were convicted. About 50 were convicted for murder, including Kumar.
Kumar, an influential Congress leader and an MP at the time, was accused in a case over the killings of five persons in Delhi’s Palam Colony on November 1 and 2 in 1984. He was awarded life imprisonment by the Delhi High Court in the case and his appeal challenging the punishment is pending before the Supreme Court.
