The Congress party has been accused of providing protection to the perpetrators of the anti-Sikh riots. Both Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar are among the main culprits of the 1984 violence, but the Congress, instead of expelling them from the party, gave them important positions. Tytler was elected as a Member of Parliament in 1984, 1991 and 2004. He was a Union Minister of State in ministries like coal, tourism and civil aviation from 1986 to 1996. His Lok Sabha ticket was withdrawn in 2009 due to controversy, but he is still a permanent member of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee.
Sajjan Kumar was sentenced to life imprisonment by a Delhi court in 2018 in a case of the Sikh riots. Even after this, the Congress did not expel him from the party, although his political activity decreased. The Shiromani Akali Dal and other Sikh organisations have accused the Congress of providing protection to the accused, but the Congress has not taken a clear stand on the issue. The party has been arguing that the judicial process should be allowed to take its course, but this silence has led to anger in the Sikh community.
The Shiromani Akali Dal, the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee and other organisations have accused the Congress and the CBI of covering up the case. The victims’ families say that if the government and the investigating agencies had acted in time, the accused would have been punished.
