Tytler's case deferred till April 28

A city court in Delhi adjourned the hearing Thursday in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case involving former Union minister and Congress nominee for Lok Sabha from North east Delhi, Jagdish Tytler till April 28. With this, all eyes have now been stuck on the Congress for revoking the Tytler’s candidature.

The Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (ACMM) Rakesh Pandit deferred the case for further hearing after the CBI counsel Sanjay Kumar argued that the court had no jurisdiction to try the case as it involved charges of murder, which can be tried only in a Sessions court.

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The counsel said the CBI has already filed a closure report in the case regarding Tytler’s complicity after recording evidence of two witnesses, as there was no sufficient evidence against him.

Meanwhile, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said that a decision would be taken soon on Jagdish Tytler’s Lok Sabha candidature. The party would take decision after considering all aspects, including ‘sensitivity’ and ‘sensibility’ of the people, he added.

In response to ‘when’, he said: ‘Very soon. Just wait and watch.’

Congress, which has been facing heat of the Sikh anger since the party declared Tytler its Lok Sabha candidate and CBI’s clean chit to the former Union minister later added fuel to the fire, is going under tremendous pressure to drop Tytler as a Lok Sabha candidate. The shoe hurling incident further intensified the pressure upon Congress and also raised the protest by Sikhs in Delhi and Punjab.

Scores of Sikhs gathered outside the Karkardooma court from the very morning and protested against the clean chit given to Jagdish Tytler by the CBI and ticket to the Lok Sabha election by the Congress.

On April 2, the CBI had given the senior Congress leader Tytler clean chit in the case of leading and inciting mobs to assassin the Sikhs during the riots, and recommended the court to quash all charges against him. The CBI in its recommendation had said the statements of two of the witnesses were “inconsistent, unreliable and unworthy of credit”.