Amod Kanth

Amod K. Kanth was the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) of Delhi's Central District in November 1984, the district of Karol Bagh, Paharganj, Darya Ganj and Kamla Market. Wikipedia says he joined the Indian Police Service in 1974 and later served as Director General of Police in Goa and in Arunachal Pradesh. He founded the children's organisation Prayas in 1988 and chaired the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights. In this history he is the police officer whom the Kapoor-Mittal Committee commended and whom the Nanavati Commission, after a notice to him, found had not failed in his duty.

In the Central District: Kusum Lata Mittal's report, submitted on 28 February 1990, says that soon after the news of the shooting spread Kanth convened a meeting of his officers and gave detailed instructions for patrolling, and that the district's police made "genuine and sincere efforts" to control the violence. It puts the deaths in the district at about 62, according to the Delhi Administration, and records that the Army reached it on the evening of 1 November. Mittal commended Kanth for providing "the right leadership and a firm desire to deal with the situation promptly and effectively", and for entering a house in Chuna Mandi, Paharganj, at great personal risk to disarm a man who was firing at the mob. She wrote that he and the Paharganj station house officer had already been given a Police Medal for gallantry, and she recommended that no action be taken against any police personnel of the district and that his role be appreciated.

Karol Bagh, 5 November 1984: His confidential letter of 7 November 1984 to Additional Commissioner of Police H.C. Jatav, copied to the Commissioner, records that on 5 November the Congress MP Dharam Dass Shastri came to Karol Bagh police station with councillors and three truckloads of men, condemned the arrest of looters and warned of dire consequences if action was taken against those holding looted property. The Nanavati Commission found that Kanth's evidence and this report supported, to some extent, the witnesses against Shastri, and that Kanth had opposed his superior Jatav's wish to treat those who had looted Sikh property leniently.

Chuna Mandi, 5 November 1984: Trilok Singh, whose family lived in a house in Chuna Mandi, alleged before the Nanavati Commission that Kanth and the station house officer, S.S. Manan, took no effective steps to disperse the mob but were strict with those defending themselves. The police said people in the house had fired first, and a case against Trilok Singh and his uncle over two deaths was withdrawn only on 28 July 1987. Kanth and Manan denied the allegations. The Nanavati Commission, after serving each of them a notice under section 8B, found that firing had continued from the house, that Kanth's account appeared more probable because a second forensic report did not rule out that the bullet which hit an army jawan came from a weapon seized in the house, and that it did "not find any reliable material" to show that either officer had failed in his duty or had an anti-Sikh attitude.

A critic's note: An editorial note by Carnage 84 that prefaces the 1984 Sikh Archive's copy of the Mittal report, and is not part of her report, says that she relied mainly on police information and commended Kanth "repeatedly for an incident which actually shows Kanth in a poor light".

Key moments

• 5 November 1984: the Karol Bagh police station episode and the Chuna Mandi firing.
• 7 November 1984: his letter to Jatav about Shastri's visit.
• 1988: founds Prayas.
• 28 February 1990: Mittal submits her report, commending him.
• 8 August 2005: the Nanavati Commission's report is tabled in Parliament.
• 2007 to 2011: chairs the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (Wikipedia).

Remembered for: In the record of 1984 Kanth is one of the officers a committee commended for the Central District's lower toll. His conduct at Chuna Mandi has been judged differently by Trilok Singh, by the Nanavati Commission and by the editors of the 1984 Sikh Archive, and all three views are recorded here.