Apex court stays Sajjan Kumar’s trial in one anti-Sikh riot case

The High Court is likely to take up the question on July 27. Kumar’s case came up in an urgent mentioning before a bench of Justice P Sathasivam and Justice B S Chauhan on Wednesday.

The High Court had refused Kumar a stay of the criminal trial,while the CBI court was scheduled to hear the final arguments of the accused persons,beginning with the Congress leader,on July 12.

Both CBI and senior advocate H S Phoolka objected to the stay order,saying this was a delaying tactic on his part. The bench,though it did not agree with them,asked the High Court to hear Kumar’s petition expeditiously.

Kumar had sought the trial court’s permission to confront the main witness and complainant in the case,Jagdish Kaur,with her affidavits and statements given earlier to the

G T Nanavati and the Ranganath Mishra commissions,which had probed the riots. He alleged contradictions in her testimony to the court and her statements before the commissions.

The court had refused him permission,saying that “even a plain reading of Section 6 of the Commissions of Inquiry Act will prohibit the use of the previous statements at the trial either for the purposes of cross-examination to contradict the witness or to impeach his credit.”

The CBI has consistently seconded the trial court’s decision,quoting provisions of the Commission of Inquiry Act to urge that affidavits and statements of a witness given before any commission cannot be used against her/him for the purpose of questioning the testimony in a trial.