Book on anti-Sikh riots of 1984 launched

The journalist, who had hurled a shoe at Union home minister P Chidambaram in April to protest the CBI's clean chit to senior Congress leader Jagdish Tytler in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, today alleged that the victims are yet to get justice even 25 years after the incident.

At the launch of his book, I Accuse — The Anti-Sikh Violence of '84 — at a function here, Jarnail Singh said, "The Sikhs have not got justice. A large number of those were involved in the massacre of innocent Sikhs, but only a few names of the accused are taken."

He regretted that despite "so many people having witnessed the massacre, non-Sikhs were not coming forward as witnesses. If they come forward, many more will be charged with the crime".

Singh said that fast track courts should be set up so that victims get justice, "which has been denied to them all these years".

Jarnail Singh, who was then working as a journalist with a Hindi daily, had flung his shoe at Chidambaram, but the minister had made quick movement to see it pass by him.

Singh admitted that the method of his protest may not have been appropriate, but added "extra-ordinary situations called for such an extra-ordinary protest method."