New Delhi: The Centre Wednesday told the Supreme Court that it has accepted the recommendations of a special investigation team (SIT), headed by retired Delhi high court judge Justice S.N. Dhingra, which has probed 186 cases of the 1984 anti-Sikh violence, and they will take appropriate action as per the laws.A bench headed by Chief Justice S.A. Bobde was informed by senior advocate R.S. Suri, appearing for the petitioner, that the report of the SIT is damning for police officials and they would file application seeking action against the cops who were allegedly involved in the ghastly crime.Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, told the bench that they have accepted the recommendations made in the report and they will take appropriate steps.“We have accepted the recommendations and we will act accordingly as per law. Lot of steps are required to be taken and it will be taken,” Mehta told the bench, also comprising Justices B.R. Gavai and Surya Kant.During the hearing, Suri referred to the SIT’s report and said the “undercurrent is that police officials cant go scot-free for the things which had happened”.“The report suggests that some action should be taken against police officials as they were in connivance. These police officials cannot go scot free. We will file a response to the report,” Suri told the bench and added that he will also file an application seeking action against police officials.Also read: Fighting Fatalism, 35 Years After the Anti-Sikh PogromsThe bench was informed by Mehta that the records of these cases are kept in the apex court registry and they should be returned to the CBI so that further proceedings can go on.The bench directed that the records be given to the Ministry of Home Affairs.The SIT, also comprising retired IPS officer Rajdeep Singh and serving IPS officer Abhishek Dular, was set up by the apex court on January 11, 2018 to supervise further investigation into 186 cases in which closure reports were filed earlier.The SIT presently has only two members as Singh had declined to be part of the team on personal grounds.Earlier, in March last year, the top court had granted two more months to the SIT to complete its probe into 186 cases after the SIT informed it that more than 50% of work was done and it wanted two more months to complete the investigation.Large-scale violence targeting members of the Sikh community had broken out in the national capital in the aftermath of the assassination of then prime minister Indira Gandhi by her two Sikh security guards on the morning of October 31, 1984. The violence had claimed 2,733 lives in Delhi alone.What the SIT’s report saysIn a scathing report on the way the 1984 anti-Sikh massacre cases were handled by the police, administration and even judiciary, the SIT has said there was no intention of punishing the culprits and acquittals were “handed over by judges” to the accused in a “routine manner”.The SIT’s report has said that “whole efforts” of the police and administration “seem to have been to hush up the criminal cases concerning riots”.The cases were registered to give “clean chit” to certain persons, it said. It said the basic reason for these crimes remaining unpunished and culprits getting scot-free was lack of interest shown by the police and the authorities in handling these cases as per law or to proceed with the intention of punishing those involved.The report is also critical of the way these cases were handled by trial courts here and said: “It is not understood how the courts proceeded with trial of several crimes of rioting, murders, arson, looting having taken place at different locations, different times and even different dates together.”The SIT has recommended exploring possibility of filing appeals, along with application for condonation of delay, against the trial court orders of acquittals in some of these cases.“Acquittals were handed over by judges to accused of 1984 riots in a routine manner,” the report said. “None of the judgements on record show that the judges were alive to the situation of 1984 riots and were alive to the fact that for delay in lodging FIRs and statement of witnesses, the victims were not responsible.”It said that due to protracted trial in these cases, the victims and witnesses were so tired of coming to the courts time and again that most of them had given up and those who had not given up, the courts refused to give credibility to their testimony on grounds, including delay in lodging of FIR and in recording evidence.The report said the scrutiny of files reveals evidence of involvement of the then inspector Survir Singh Tyagi, then SHO of Kalyan Puri police station, in a conspiracy with rioters.Also read: 1984: Thirty-Five Years On, Sikh Survivors of India’s Deadliest Massacre Await Justice“It was a case where Insp. Survir Singh Tyagi deliberately disarmed local Sikhs of their licensed arms so that rioters could make them victim and cause loss of life and property. He was suspended from service but later on reinstated and promoted as ACP. The committee is of the view that his case be referred to riots cell of Delhi Police for action,” it said.The report said that perusal of files revealed that FIRs were not registered by the police incident-wise or crime-wise and instead, several complaints were clubbed in one FIR.“Even the judges and magistrate did not give directions to the police to file separate ‘challans’ (police report) incident-wise/crime-wise,” it said.Sikh passengers dragged from trainsSikh passengers were dragged out of trains and killed at railway stations in Delhi during the violence but the police did not arrest anyone from the spot saying that they were outnumbered, the SIT has said.It said these incidents had happened on November 1 and 2, 1984 at five railway stations of Delhi – Nangloi, Kishanganj, Dayabasti, Shahdara and Tuglakabad.“In all these five cases, police was informed about the rioters having stopped the train and attacking Sikh passengers. The Sikh passengers were dragged out of trains and were beaten to death and burnt. The dead bodies were found scattered on the platforms and the railway lines,” the report said.“The police had not arrested any of the rioters from the spot. The reasons for non-arrest was shown that the police was in very small number and that the rioters, after seeking police, had ran away,” it said.It said that perusal of files revealed that FIRs were not registered by police incident-wise or crime-wise and instead, several complaints were clubbed in one FIR.The report said that the then Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) had sent 337 complaints received by him soon after the riots to Sultan Puri Police station but an “omnibus” FIR was lodged in respect of all these incidents and thereafter all other complaints of killing and rioting were added in the same FIR.Also read: Review: India in 1984, and a World Bound By CompassionIt said one such FIR had complaints regarding 498 incidents and only one investigating officer was assigned to the case.“In a few cases, FIRs were registered on the basis of a note given by a police official to SHO (station house officer) stating about a victim identifying a person as rioter and also giving the name and address of victim,” it said.All these cases were closed on the ground that victim did not confirm to the information. It is obvious that these cases were registered by the police to give clean chit to certain persons,” the report said.It said that hundreds of affidavits were received by Justice Ranganath Misra Commission in respect of killing, arson, looting done by the rioters with named accused persons.“Instead of directing registration of FIRs on the basis of these affidavits directly to the respective police stations and ordering investigation, committees after committees were formed and this further delayed registration of cases for years,” it said.Regarding an FIR lodged at Kalyan Puri police station here, the report said police had clubbed various cases and sent a ‘challan’ (police report) in respect of murder of 56 persons but the trial court had framed charges only in respect of killing of five.“It is not known why charges were framed only for five murders and not 56 murders and why trial court did not order separation of trial for each incident of crime,” it said.“It is also seen from the perusal of judgements found in these files that when the witness stated in the court that she had seen the incident and can identify the culprits, the public prosecutor did not even ask her to identify the rioters out of several accused persons present in the court,” it said.“The judge conducting the trial, having ample power under section 165 of Evidence Act to ask the questions to the witnesses, also did not bother to ask the witness as to who out the accused persons present in the court were among the rioters and had committed riots,” the report said.(With PTI inputs)