Harvinderjit Singh Gill

Harvinderjit Singh Gill was a 20-year-old B.Sc. student at Khalsa College, Amritsar, shot dead with his friend Mandeep Singh outside the Golden Temple complex on 22 May 1992. The police recorded the killings as an encounter. The account here is that of the Committee for Coordination on Disappearances in Punjab (CCDP) in its report Reduced to Ashes, which draws on an incident report form filled in by his father and on people it says witnessed the shooting.

Who he was: In the report's account he was the only son of a former soldier who was wounded and taken prisoner in the 1962 war with China, lost both feet to frostbite and became a teacher. Harvinderjit was a final-year B.Sc. student in Food Technology at Khalsa College and a member of the Sikh Students Federation, who the report says had never been arrested.

The killing: At about 1:30 p.m. on 22 May 1992 Harvinderjit and Mandeep Singh went to the SGPC's office in the Golden Temple complex, carrying their student identity cards. As they left, the report says, DSP Rattan Lal Monga, in plain clothes, caught Harvinderjit by the arm and told him to be frisked. He did not know the man was a police officer and protested, a scuffle followed, and DSP Monga ordered his subordinates to shoot. In the report's account, Punjab police shot him dead on the road. Mandeep Singh, who had tried to stop the quarrel, ran into a tea shop; the report says DSP Monga came after him, had him dragged out and shot. Sadar police station registered FIR No. 36, claiming an encounter.

Afterwards: Policemen came to the house that evening, and one remarked that "he has passed his B.Sc.". Next morning the father read of two young Sikhs killed outside the Golden Temple, and the police asked him to identify a body; he identified his son. The police cremated both young men after recording them as "unidentified militants". The CBI's list of cremations records them as partially identified, with names and fathers' names but no addresses. Witnesses, mostly shopkeepers, told the father how DSP Monga had killed both, but declined to be quoted.

Key moments

• 22 May 1992: Harvinderjit Singh Gill and Mandeep Singh are shot dead; FIR No. 36 is registered as an encounter.
• 23 May 1992: the Sadar Amritsar police cremate both, as the CBI's list records.
• 17 June 1992: the two fathers petition the Prime Minister for an impartial investigation, with copies to the Home Minister, the Chief Minister and other officials. The petition went unacknowledged.
• 2 January 1998: the Punjab and Haryana High Court, on their petition of 1997, says they may file a complaint in the lower court and that it will not investigate disputed facts of a case from 1992. Harvinderjit's father then decided to file no more complaints.

Remembered for: being one of the young men whose killings the CCDP's report lists among cases the police reported as encounters, and whose families it says found no inquiry.