NEW DELHI, Dec 2:
A Delhi court today reserved its order on a plea of Congress leader Sajjan Kumar seeking to drop nine CBI witnesses in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case in which he and three others are facing prosecution.
District judge J R Aryan fixed December 11 for pronouncing the order after hearing arguments of the counsel for the CBI, accused and the victims.
The CBI had earlier said though the charge sheet pertains to killing of six persons but it was only restricting the charge relating to murder of Surjit Singh and not of other deceased persons in respect of whom the trial had already taken place.
Kumar and three other accused, in their plea, have sought removal of agency’s witnesses claiming they were “irrelevant”.
Kumar’s counsel had earlier said that the CBI had filed a consolidated charge sheet of three separate FIRs and the nine prosecution witnesses, who are not related to the murder of victim Surjit Singh, should be removed.
He had said three separate FIRs were registered for the murder of six persons but if CBI was restricting its case to only one murder then the witnesses who are not related to this murder should be removed.
The CBI had, however, opposed Kumar’s plea saying it is for the agency to decide who are relevant or irrelevant witnesses and whom they want to remove.
Kumar’s plea was also opposed by senior advocate H S Phoolka, appearing for the riot victims, saying the nine witnesses are “very important” and leaving them out will be miscarriage of justice.
The court had earlier framed various charges including murder and rioting against Kumar, Brahmanand Gupta, Peru, Khushal Singh and Ved Prakash in connection with killing of a man in Sultanpuri area in the riots that had occurred after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984. Accused Khushal Singh has died.
The court is yet to fix a date for beginning the trial by recording statements of prosecution witnesses.
The court also fixed December 11 for hearing arguments on another application of Kumar and others seeking summoning of records of the two other riots-related cases which have already been decided.
In the other plea, the accused have sought summoning of judicial records of two riot cases of Sultanpuri area which were decided in 2002 and 2003 as some of the witnesses of this case had also deposed during those trials.
Kumar was not an accused in both the cases which had resulted in acquittal of others.
In July 2010, the trial court had framed charges of murder and rioting against the accused in connection with the case of killing of Surjit Singh in Sultanpuri here.
The trial court had also framed charges for the offence of spreading enmity between two communities against the accused in the case.
CBI had filed two charge sheets against Kumar and others in January 2010 in the riots cases registered in 2005 on the recommendation of Justice G T Nanavati Commission which had probed the sequence of events leading to the violence. (PTI)
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