A Delhi Police official, deposing in a 1984 anti-Sikh riot case, informed a city court on Monday that the Shahdara Police station records, which contained entries of riot victim's complaints, were not available as the same have already been destroyed.
Constable Krishan Kumar, who in 1998 was the record-keeper of the police station, informed Additional Sessions Judge Rajinder Kumar that the Dispatch and Complaint register of 1984 have already been destroyed by a departmental order.
On being asked about the content of the complaint of Harvinder Kaur, who lost her husband, son and son-in-law in the massacre, Kumar said: "I do not know the content of the complaint dated November six, 1984."
On being confronted whether the complaint, which was in the court records, was the same received by the Police in 1984, Kumar said, "I can not confirm this fact due to want of original register...."
As per the prosecution, Kaur's husband Niranjan Singh, a head constable who was then stationed at Shahdara railway station, was lynched and set ablaze by the rioters on November one, 1984,
a day after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
A day after this fateful incident, her 17-year-old son Gurpal Singh and son-in-law Mahender Singh were killed by the mob led by the same accused.
The first information case in the case was lodged in 1996 when Kaur, who survived the riot, lodged a complaint with the Jain and Banerjee Committee constituted to look into the anti-Sikh riot cases.
Kaur, in her complaint, had alleged former Union Minister H K L Bhagat and five others -- Harprasad Bhardwaj, Suraj Giri, Ram Prasad Tiwari, Jagdish Giri and the lone woman accused Kamlesh -- were the persons who killed her relatives during a riot at Mansarovar Park in east Delhi.
However, Bhagat was later discharged from the case for want of evidence. All the five are booked under various relevant sections including 302 (murder) 395 (dacoity), 436 (burning houses), 147 (rioting) of the Indian Penal Code.
