The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear the bail plea of Congress leader Sajjan Kumar’s life sentence in the 1984 anti-Sikh riot case, PTI reported.
A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi took note of the submissions made by Kumar’s counsel Shekhar Naphade. “We will see to it,” the court said when Naphade asked for an urgent listing of the bail application.
In December 2018, the Delhi High Court had sentenced Kumar to life imprisonment and held him guilty of murder, promoting enmity between groups, and defiling public property. The Central Bureau of Investigation in April had opposed the 73-year-old’s plea, saying that he was responsible for the “gruesome” massacre of Sikhs and described it as genocide.
The Delhi High Court’s verdict had reversed a lower court’s 2013 judgement, which had acquitted Kumar. He was sent to jail after he surrendered before a trial court on December 31. Kumar had also resigned from the Congress after his conviction.
Anti-Sikh riots broke out after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984, by her two Sikh bodyguards.
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