Indian court orders new probe
A court asked India's federal police to reinvestigate anti-Sikh riots in 1984 after a witness surfaced to implicate a former minister in the violence that killed nearly 3,000 people.
The riots in New Delhi, among India's bloodiest in modern times, were in retaliation against the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. Most of those killed were Sikhs.
About eight cases related to the riots are either the subject of tortuous trials or are still being investigated. Around six have resulted in convictions.
But the one most keenly followed involves former federal minister Jagdish Tytler, a leading member of the ruling Congress party, who is accused of inciting violence against Sikhs.
He was forced to resign as a junior minister in 2005 after protests sparked by an inquiry that said he might have instigated the riots. Tytler, implicated by two judicial commissions, has denied the charge, and this month the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) told a Delhi court it did not have any evidence against him and that a lone witness was untraceble.
It had asked that Tytler be exonerated of all charges.
But the Indian media quickly traced the witness, Jasbir Singh, who said CBI did not contact him despite being aware of his whereabouts.
On Tuesday, the court asked the CBI to reinvestigate Tytler's involvement, record Singh's statement and file a report by January 16.
"The judge said reinvestigate Tytler's involvement and record Jasbir Singh's statement and any other statement the CBI wishes," H.S. Phulka, counsel for the riot victims, said.
Singh, who lives in California, told the CNN-IBN television channel that he saw Tytler incite a mob and lead an attack on a Sikh temple in November 1984.
"I can come anywhere I am asked to depose against that killer," Singh told the news channel.
Gandhi's assassination, in October 1984, was carried out in revenge for her decision to send the army to flush Sikh separatists out of the Golden Temple - Sikhism's holiest shrine - in the northern city of Amritsar in June 1984.
The raid damaged the shrine, enraging Sikhs.
The government says nearly 3,000 Sikhs were killed in the riots following her death, while human rights activists say the figure was closer to 4,000.
Activists accuse Congress of having turned a blind eye to the killing of Sikhs and say some of its leaders helped orchestrate the rioting. Sikhs make up around two percent of Hindu-majority India's population of more than 1 billion.
