The top court has sought Central Bureau of Investigation's response over a petition filed by former Congress councillor Balwan Khokhar, serving life imprisonment in a 1984 Sikh riots case, seeking suspension of his life sentence.
A bench of Justices JK Maheshwari and Rajesh Bindal asked Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati to get certificates from jail authorities on the convict’s conduct and behaviour.
Bhati told the court that Khokhar’s bail was rejected on three occasions in the past.
Besides Khokhar, former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar is serving a life term in the case.
Erstwhile MLA Mahender Yadav, who was sentenced to imprisonment for 10 years, died of Covid in Mandoli jail.
Kumar and Khokhar have been lodged in Tihar jail since their conviction on December 17, 2018.
The Delhi High Court upheld Khokhar’s sentence in 2018 and overturned Kumar’s acquittal by the trial court in 2013.
The case relates to the killing of five sikhs — Kehar Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Raghuvender Singh, Narender Pal Singh and Kuldeep Singh — of the same family, in the Raj Nagar part-I area in Palam Colony in South West Delhi on November 1-2, 1984, and the burning down of a Gurdwara in Raj Nagar part II, following Indira Gandhi’s assassination on October 31, 1984.
The riots had broken out after the assassination of then-prime minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984, by her two Sikh bodyguards. The riots broke out after her assassination.
On the recommendation of the Justice GT Nanavati Commission, the case against the convicts was registered in 2005.
In 2013, the trial court then convicted five of them — Khokkar, former legislator Mahender Yadav, Kishan Khokkar, Girdhari Lal and Captain Bhagmal — while acquitting Congress leader Sajjan Kumar.
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