Spelling more trouble for the Congress, an expose by investigative news portal Cobrapost has claimed that the local police had colluded with the government of the day, which gave a free hand to the perpetrators of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots.
The sting operation codenamed ‘Chapter 84’, which is said to have been carried out over a period of one-year, was screened before the media in the form of a 90-minute documentary on Tuesday.
It also featured senior counsel and AAP Ludhiana candidate H S Phoolka, who claimed that the police had closed 241 of the 587 cases, it had filed during the riots, on their own.
Some of the retired Station House Officers (SHOs)were caught on camera admitting the failure of the police force in checking the orgy of violence. Also, they stated on the record that their superiors had colluded with the then government to teach the Sikhs a lesson.
Moreover, they claimed that the top brass did not allow them to act against the rioters and even the police log books were changed and only two per cent of the records were maintained. The officers also stated that some of their colleagues had even refused to file cases.
A few officers also alleged that even messages were sent asking the policemen not to take action against the rioters shouting ‘Indira Gandhi zindabad’. Besides, it was alleged that permission was not given to open fire on the rioters and that the entire police force had been rendered rudderless during the carnage.
Not only that, even the bodies of the victims were dumped far away from the scene of the rioting to bring down the official toll. The sting claimed that even the firefighters refused to go to the areas from where cases of arson were reported.
The sting mentioned the names of senior Congress leaders like Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar as well as H K L Bhagat and D Shastri (who have since died) in connection with the riots.
In his affidavit, then Patel Nagar SHO Amrik Singh Bhullar had accused some local leaders of instigating and leading the frenzied mobs.