Delhi court allows 1984 riots accused Sajjan Kumar to confront prosecution witness

New Delhi: A Delhi court on Wednesday allowed Congress leader Sajjan Kumar, an accused in a 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, to confront a prosecution witness in a related case. [caption id=“attachment_2994974” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Sajjan Kumar. AP[/caption] District Judge Amar Nath passed the direction after he was told by Kumar’s counsel that he wanted to confront prosecution witness Sheela Kaur with her statement made on 10 February, 1985, in another case. The submission was opposed by the CBI which told the court that during probe, it was found that the local police was hand in glove with the perpetrators and hence they had deliberately not recorded the victim’s statement in a fair and impartial manner. However, the court said the witness will be confronted with her previous statement in accordance with law and posted the matter to 21 October. The court was recording statement of prosecution witness Sheela Kaur whose husband, brother-in-law and father-in-law were killed in the 1984 riots. The case was transferred from Karkardooma court to Patiala House court by the Delhi High Court which had directed the district judge to video record the proceedings at the cost of the accused. Kumar and two other accused, Brahmanand Gupta and Ved Prakash, had told the court that they were ready to bear the expenses of videography of proceedings in the matter. These three accused are facing trial on charges of murder and rioting in the case pertaining to killing of Surjit Singh in Sultanpuri. The proceedings in the case were earlier stayed after the victim and complainant Joginder Singh had approached the high court seeking transfer of the case to another court alleging that the evidence was not being properly recorded. While transferring the case, the high court had made it clear that the transfer was “warranted to protect and uphold the dignity of the judicial system and to promote the faith of citizens in courts of law”.