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Phoolka’s new book aims
at shaking pogrom-
programed
India out of stupor
WSN Network
NEW
DELHI: Senior Supreme Court advocate and relentless fighter for the
cause of 1984 victims of anti-Sikh pogroms, Sardar Harvinder Singh
Phoolka, has claimed in his forthcoming book, When A Tree Shook
Delhi, that the Ranganath Misra Commission which probed the
genocidal killings, deliberately suppressed the facts and instead
presented a “diluted” version of events. It clearly and
unambiguously blames the police for the mass killings.
When a Tree Shook Delhi, co-authored by Phoolka with senior
journalist Manoj Mitta, gives an “uncensored” insight into the
events which forever blighted the face of India. Detailing incidents
in East Delhi, Phoolka gives grim details what can make anyone’s
blood boil. Beginning with the attack on the then President Giani
Zail Singh's cavalcade in front of AIIMS, the book traces the
genesis of the violence through eyewitness accounts and the
investigations by Phoolka as counsel for the victims.
In
a stinging aspersions cast on the probe held by the Misra
Commission, Phoolka minced no words in saying that “Misra had not
just shut out the public and the press. Unknown to us, we had also
been excluded from crucial parts of the inquiry.”
India’s Congress party later made Ranganath Mishra an MP in the
Rajya Sabha, ignoring even the time tested tradition of not
politicizing at least Supreme Court Chief Justices.
"Far from booking aggressors, the police cracked down on the victims
-- the Sikhs who had been exercising the right of self defense at
home," the book says.
"The essence of all the findings on the Block 11 events in
Kalyanpuri is unmistakable: that the police colluded with a mob to
kill members of a minority community," says the book.
On
the Ranganath Misra Commission constituted to probe the violence, it
says “given the circumstances in which it was appointed, the Misra
Commission faced a credibility crisis from its very birth. For
almost six months, the government had blatantly stone-walled all
demands for an inquiry into the carnage”.
“The Rajiv Gandhi regime made no bones about the fact that it had
appointed the inquiry merely to pave the way for an accord on the
long festering Punjab problem,” the book goes on to say.
Comparing the situation in Delhi with that in Kolkata, which had
also witnessed initial violence against the Sikhs, the book says,
"The failure of Delhi authorities to respond to the early signals of
trouble contrasted with the alacrity displayed by their counterparts
in Kolkata.
Significantly, mob violence broke out in Kolkata even before it did
in Delhi. The violence, however, fizzled out in Kolkata because at
the first sign of attacks on Sikhs, the local government led by
Communists immediately called in the army to restore law and order,"
it reads.
31
October, 2007
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