The Delhi High Court had sentenced Sajjan Kumar to life imprisonment over killing of five Sikhs at Raj Nagar Part I in Palam Colony on November 1-2, 1984. (PTI File)
Former CongressMember of Parliament (MP) Sajjan Kumar, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in a murder case linked to the 1984 anti-Sikh violence in Delhi, has died. The 80-year-old Kumar had been suffering from multiple ailments.
Kumar had been lodged in Tihar Jail since 2018, and he was brought to Safdarjung Hospital from the prison on Thursday (August 20) morning. He was declared dead at the hospital.
The Delhi High Court had sentenced Kumar to life imprisonment in 2018 in a case relating to the killing of five Sikhs at Raj Nagar Part I in Palam Colony on November 1-2, 1984, and the burning down of a gurdwara in Raj Nagar Part II.
Kumar’s appeal against the 2018 sentencing was to be heard on Thursday. His lawyers Anil Kumar Sharma and Anuj Sharma had also moved for parole, citing his age and medical condition, as well as the medical condition of his wife.
In February 2025, a court in Delhi had sentenced Kumar to life imprisonment in another case of murder linked to the organised mob violence that had broken out in Delhi after the assassination, on October 31, 1984, of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by two Sikh bodyguards.
Kumar was accused of leading the mob that had burned alive a Sikh man named Jaswant Singh and his son Tarundeep Singh in Saraswati Vihar in northwest Delhi on November 1, 1984, and had destroyed and looted their home.
More recently, in January 2026, a Delhi court had acquitted Kumar in a case relating to the inciting of violence in Janakpuri and Vikaspuri in West Delhi during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots. There was “no evidence of [Kumar] instigating any such mob”, or “of [a] conspiracy”, the court had ruled.
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Back in February 2015, Kumar was named as an accused in two cases based on complaints of violence in Janakpuri and Vikaspuri during the riots.
One FIR was over the violence in Janakpuri, where two men, Sohan Singh and his son-in-law Avtar Singh, were killed on November 1, 1984. The other FIR was registered in connection with the death of one Gurcharan Singh, who was allegedly set ablaze in Vikaspuri the next day (on November 2).
Kumar had been acquitted in four other cases pertaining to violence in Sultanpuri during the 1984 riots. Two appeals against his acquittals are pending in the High Court.
Kumar had appealed against his conviction in one case, which was pending in the Supreme Court.
More than 2,700 members of the Sikh community were killed in four days of violence in Delhi in the aftermath of Indira’s assassination. A total of 587 FIRs were registered in the capital, but only 28 cases have ended in convictions so far.
Thirteen of the convictions have come in murder cases. While 241 of these cases have been filed as ‘untraced’, 253 have ended in acquittals.
Forty FIRs are pending trial and one case is pending investigation. Eleven FIRs have been quashed, and in 11 other FIRs, the accused have been discharged.
Three cases have been withdrawn.
Around 20 cases relating to the riots are still pending across Delhi’s courts.
Nirbhay Thakur is a Senior Correspondent with The Indian Express who primarily covers district courts in Delhi and has reported on the trials of many high-profile cases since 2023.
Professional Background
Education: Nirbhay is an economics graduate from Delhi University.
Beats: His reporting spans the trial courts, and he occasionally interviews ambassadors and has a keen interest in doing data stories.
Specializations: He has a specific interest in data stories related to courts.
Core Strength: Nirbhay is known for tracking long-running legal sagas and providing meticulous updates on high-profile criminal trials.
Recent notable articles
In 2025, he has written long form articles and two investigations. Along with breaking many court stories, he has also done various exclusive stories.
1) A long form on Surender Koli, accused in the Nithari serial killings of 2006. He was acquitted after spending 2 decades in jail. was a branded man. Deemed the “cannibal" who allegedly lured children to his employer’s house in Noida, murdered them, and “ate their flesh” – his actions cited were cited as evidence of human depravity at its worst. However, the SC acquitted him finding various lapses in the investigation. The Indian Express spoke to his lawyers and traced the 2 decades journey.
2) For decades, the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has been at the forefront of the Government’s national rankings, placed at No. 2 over the past two years alone. It has also been the crucible of campus activism, its protests often spilling into national debates, its student leaders going on to become the faces and voices of political parties of all hues and thoughts. The Indian Express looked at all court cases spanning over two decades and did an investigation.
3) Investigation on the 700 Delhi riots cases. The Indian Express found that in 17 of 93 acquittals (which amounted to 85% of the decided cases) in Delhi riots cases, courts red-flag ‘fabricated’ evidence and pulled up the police.
Signature Style
Nirbhay’s writing is characterized by its procedural depth. He excels at summarizing 400-page chargesheets and complex court orders into digestible news for the general public.
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