New Delhi
Bringing to justice the first-ever senior Congress functionary for his role in the 1984 Sikh carnage, the Delhi High Court today convicted former MP Sajjan Kumar of criminal conspiracy to murder five people of the minority community, sentencing him to imprisonment for the rest of his natural life.

Sajjan Kumar, 73, has been ordered to surrender by December 31, failing which he would be taken into custody. He also cannot leave Delhi.Reversing Sajjan Kumar’s acquittal by Delhi’s Karkardooma Courts on April 30, 2013, in the case pertaining to the killing of five members of a Sikh family in Delhi Cantonment’s Raj Nagar on November 1 and 2, 1984, the HC said the trial court failed to address the charges of criminal conspiracy against Sajjan Kumar.

Noting that the attackers adopted a two-pronged strategy in the wake of former PM Indira Gandhi’s assassination on October 31, 1984, the HC said, “The first strategy was to liquidate all Sikh males and the other was to destroy houses, leaving the women and children utterly destitute. The trial court completely omitted to address this charge of criminal conspiracy. The acquittal of Sajjan Kumar is set aside. He is convicted for criminal conspiracy, for abetting the commission of armed rioting and murders and for the offence of delivering provocative speeches instigating violence against Sikhs.” As soon as the Bench of Justice S Muralidhar and Justice Vinod Goel concluded delivering the sentence in a packed court room 3, riot survivors Jagdish Kaur, her cousin Jagsher Singh and another survivor Nirpreet Kaur broke down.

“We have got partial relief today. We will seek death sentence for Sajjan Kumar in the Supreme Court,” they said of the judgment that not just reversed Sajjan Kumar’s acquittal but also enhanced (from three years’ rigorous imprisonment to 10) the convictions of two other accused in the matter.

Jagdish Kaur, 77, principal complainant, lost her husband Kehar Singh, 18-year-old son Gurpreet Singh and three cousins on November 1 and 2, 1984, in the killings the HC today equated with “Partition massacres”. The court went many steps further to call Sikh murders of 1984 crimes against humanity.