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WE EXIST! You just don't see us!
WSN Bureau
Minister after minister is
found involved. And law enforcers simply can't stop terming
witnesses as untraceable. Shame traced again.
 NEW DELHI: When must a nation hang its head in shame? When a man
thousands know, believe and say was part of a blood-thirsty communal
massacre is made a minister? Or when he finally has to quit that
position because a government-appointed commission of inquiry says
there is merit in the allegations against him? Or when the country's
top sleuthing agency is caught red handed trying to close the case
against him? Or when a court tells the agency to stop in its tracks
and keep the case open? When must a nation hang its head in shame?
No wonder, the Indian Prime Minister did not even take up the issue
of human rights in China, a country hardly known for respecting any.
All that the Chinese leadership would have needed to whisper in his
ears to stop it was "1984".
But shame continues to pile, India's silence and CBI's tactics
notwithstanding.
First, the media tracked a witness in hours after CBI told the court
it couldn;t find him in years. Then another witness was caught on
camera by a leading Indian TV channel who described in gory detail
how Jagdish Tytler led a mob that beat, maim and burn alive Sikh
after Sikh. Now, another witness, this time a woman, has come
forward to say that she was listed as "untraced" as a witness, she
has been throughout trying to testify. her locus standi? Her two
young sons were burnt before her eyes during the October 1984
genocide of Sikhs in Delhi.
Bhagwni Devi, now 65 and a witness in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, is
listed as untraced in police records. And she is not the only
“untraced” witness ready to present her version on the riots; there
are at least nine more such witnesses ready to help protracted
investigations into the mass killings.
Bhagwani Devi claims the police did not record her statement even
once, although she has been trying to give her testimony She even
filed affidavits before the Justice M.L. Jain and A.K. Bannerji
Committee in July 1987 and the Nanavati Commission in 2005, seeking
permission to present her version.
“My sons Hoshiar Singh (21) and Mohan Singh (18) were dragged out of
the house and burnt alive in front of my eyes,” says Bhagwani, who
lived in Sultanpuri during the riots and now lives in Rohini.
“I lost everything when I lost my sons, I want the police to record
my statement,” Indian media quoted her as saying. She was
interviewed by the country's leading news agency Press Trust of
India. She claimed that she had seen a Congress leader leading a mob
and instigating it to “kill Sikhs”.
No, she had not kept quiet all these years. Bhagwani Devi, who earns
her livelihood working as a maid, had approached the police
repeatedly to give her statement but the efforts proved futile. “The
only thing the police did was to ask me to fill some papers for the
loss suffered,” said Bhagwani, recounting the 23-year-old incidents.
She said a general FIR (No. 250/84) was lodged at the Sultanpuri
police station, but the police refused to file a complaint against
the Congress leader.
There were many more witnesses who had been declared “untraced”
despite their being alive and available. “On the basis of her
affidavit, an investigation should be initiated into the role of the
Congress leader named by Bhagwani in her affidavit,” a riot victims'
leader said. Clearly, the Delhi Police tried to cover up by
declaring Bhagwani Devi untraced on May 14, 1995. Not only her, but
many other victims, whom the police declared untraced, are ready to
come forward and help in investigation.
The statements of Bhagwani and other witnesses must be recorded at
the earliest so that the accused did not go scot-free for lack of
evidence, but the police or CBI have already lost even the last
shred of credibility.
The readiness of Bhagwani to record her statement on the riots comes
close on the heels of another key “untraced” witness Jasbir Singh
coming forward to help in the probe.
Jasbir Singh, who lives in the US, talked to TV channels here,
saying he was willing to help in investigation, but wanted the CBI
to approach him in California as he feared for his life in India.
The CBI had filed a closure report in the 1984 riots case involving
Congress leader Jagdish Tytler and had claimed that Jasbir, who had
submitted an affidavit before the Nanavati Commission, was not
traceable.
16 January 2008
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