Bibi Bhagwani

Bibi Bhagwani was a Sikh woman of Sultanpuri in Delhi who survived the November 1984 pogrom, the Tesra Ghallughara, and spent the rest of her life seeking justice for her two sons. She is remembered as a survivor and as a named witness against Sajjan Kumar, then the Member of Parliament for her area.

In an affidavit to the Nanavati Commission, she stated that on 1 November 1984 Sajjan Kumar came to her house with a mob and ordered the inmates killed and the house burned. She said her sons Hoshiar Singh, aged 21, and Mohan Singh, aged 18, were dragged out and burned before her eyes. She said the military rescued the family on 3 November and took them to Rani Bagh camp, from where they were turned out on 12 November when the camp was closed. She added that the police did not record her statement, gave her only a paper listing her losses, and never investigated the killing of her sons.

Key moments

• 1 to 3 November 1984. Her sons were killed and her house burned in Sultanpuri, by her account.
• 27 July 2013. She died in New Delhi. Sikh Siyasat News reported that she had waited 29 years for justice and that no trial against Sajjan Kumar in the Sultanpuri case had taken place.
• 3 December 2013. Months after her death, the Supreme Court dismissed Kumar's petition to drop the murder charge in the Sultanpuri case.
• 31 December 2018. Kumar surrendered after the Delhi High Court convicted him in a different 1984 case, the killing of five Sikhs in Raj Nagar, Palam Colony.
• 20 September 2023. A Delhi court gave Kumar the benefit of doubt and acquitted him in a Sultanpuri case over the killing of Surjit Singh.

Sikh Siyasat News headlined her death as that of a survivor who waited 29 years and did not get justice.