A
U.S. federal court on Wednesday issued a summons to Sonia Gandhi, the president
of the ruling-Congress party, for allegedly protecting members of her party
whom the group says were involved in anti-Sikh riots in New Delhi in 1984.
Ms.
Gandhi is currently in the U.S. for a medical checkup after she fell sick in
the Indian Parliament last week and had to leave the house during a debate.
Sikhs
for Justice, a U.S. based non-profit, along with Jasbir Singh, and Mohender
Singh, whose relatives were killed during days of rioting in the capital when
around 3,000 people, mainly Sikhs, died, filed a civil suit in a U.S. district
court alleging Ms. Gandhi played a “leading role in shielding the members,
office bearers, leaders and supporters of her party that played an active role
in the Genocide.”
And
she “conspired with and aided and abetted others” including local police
officers, fellow Congress officials and para-military groups,” read the suit,
reviewed by India Real Time.
The
legal complaint also alleged that, last month, a group of Congress workers
attacked a colony in New Delhi where some witnesses of the anti-Sikh riots
live.
The
court confirmed they had received such a lawsuit. District courts in the U.S
normally issue summons on receipt of a lawsuit and it is the responsibility of
those bringing the suit to deliver it to the person being sued.
In
1984, Indian security forces led an operation against armed Sikh militants at
the Golden Temple in the northern Indian city of Amritsar killing hundreds of
people. This led to the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by
her Sikh bodyguards, which in turn prompted deadly riots in New Delhi.
In
a statement, Gurpatwant S Pannun, Sikhs for Justice’s legal advisor, said the
group was seeking compensatory and punitive damages against Ms. Gandhi for the
role they accuse her of playing in protecting Congress members including Kamal
Nath, Sajjan Kumar, and Jagdish Tytler, whom the group allege were involved in
the riots in 1984.
The
summons by the court of the Eastern District of New York, provided by the group
Sikhs for Justice, asked Ms. Gandhi to serve an answer to the complainant
within 21 days of receipt.
Ms.
Gandhi couldn’t be reached for comment. Phone calls and messages to the
Congress party went unanswered.
“Summons issued almost 30 years after the
event when the Congress president is on a medical visit is, to put it mildly,
astonishing. Undoubtedly, appropriate legal action will be taken,” Abhishek
Manu Singhvi, a member of the Congress, was quoted as saying by the news agency
Press Trust of India.
A
trial against Mr. Kumar in a case related to the anti-Sikh riots is ongoing in
the Delhi High Court, while the Central Bureau of Investigation, India’s
federal investigative body, is probing Mr. Tytler’s alleged role in the riots.
Both Mr. Kumar and Mr. Tytler have denied the allegations.
Mr.
Nath has denied the allegations and has never been charged abroad or in India.
The
Sikh group has filed the complaint under the Alien Tort Statute, which allows
U.S. citizens to file civil suits in federal courts for violations of
international law, and under the Torture Victims Protection Act under which a
civil case can be filed against any official in a foreign nation for extrajudicial
killings or torture.
This
is not the first time a Sikh group has filed a case against Congress
politicians abroad.
In
January this year, Sikhs for Justice also filed a complaint with the Swiss
attorney general’s office seeking the arrest of Kamal Nath, now India’s
parliamentary affairs minister, for crimes against humanity in the Sikh riots
of 1984. Mr. Nath was visiting Switzerland for the World Economic Forum in
Davos.
A
spokeswoman for the Switzerland’s attorney general at the time said the office
could not act on the complaint because Swiss law regarding genocide applies to
acts committed during war and only from the year 2000 onward.
The
attorney general forwarded the case to regional authorities in Grisons in
eastern Switzerland, where Davos is located, as there may be a case against Mr.
Nath for damages related to the 1984 incident, the spokeswoman added.
A
spokesman for the prosecutor’s office in Grisons said the complaint was not
pursued and had been shelved.
In 2012, a New York judge dismissed a criminal complaint against Mr. Nath over the riots, saying the court had no jurisdiction over the matter.
