Pul Bangash Massacre

Who: Three Sikhs killed outside Gurdwara Pul Bangash: Thakur Singh, Badal Singh and Gurcharan Singh. The CBI charges that Jagdish Tytler, a senior Congress leader, incited the mob. Tytler pleaded not guilty.

What: On 1 November 1984, the day after Indira Gandhi's assassination, a mob of over a thousand set fire to Gurdwara Pul Bangash and three Sikhs were killed. Lakhvinder Kaur, widow of Badal Singh and the complainant, told the court in October 2024 what the granthi, Surender Singh, had told her: that her husband was killed by the mob and that Tytler was urging it on, telling people to kill Sikhs and burn the gurdwara. Another witness says Tytler stepped out of a white car in front of the gurdwara and provoked the crowd.

Where: Gurdwara Pul Bangash, Azad Market, north Delhi.

Why it mattered: This is one of the longest-running attempts to prosecute a senior political figure over 1984. The Nanavati Commission found credible evidence that Tytler very probably helped organise attacks on Sikhs. The CBI cleared him in 2007 and again in 2009; in April 2013 a Delhi court ordered further investigation. In August 2014 a trial court acquitted one accused, Suresh Kumar alias Panewala, calling the case against him very weak, while the Tytler inquiry stayed pending. A third CBI closure report was rejected on 4 December 2015 after a protest petition by Lakhvinder Kaur.

In 2023 the CBI filed a chargesheet saying Tytler "incited, instigated and provoked" the mob at the gurdwara, under the Indian Penal Code sections for rioting and for abetment of murder. On 30 August 2024 Special Judge Rakesh Siyal ordered charges framed; on 13 September 2024 they were framed at Rouse Avenue Court and Tytler pleaded not guilty. The Delhi High Court listed his plea against the framing of charges for 29 November 2024. At the latest reports available the trial was under way and no verdict had been given.