NEW DELHI, Dec 23: Two persons have been sentenced to death by an additional sessions court here today for their role in murdering four youths during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in the wake of the assassination of Indira Gandhi.

Additional sessions judge O P Dwivedi in this 18-page order sentenced Manohar Lal alias Mannu and Jagdish alias Jagga to death for the killing of four brothers Laxman Singh, Hoshiar Singh, Shaman Singh and Darshan Singh on November 2, 1984, in Kalyanpuri area of east Delhi.

The order said that the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt the involvement of Mannu and Jagga in the killing of the four brothers who were first assaulted with iron rods and then set on fire by a mob.

Under Section 302 (culpable homicide amounting to murder) each of them has been sentenced to death and fined Rs 30,000 in default of which they would undergo two years rigorous imprisonment, the judge said.

The orders says, ``They should be hanged by neck till they are dead and the amount of fine, if realised, should be paid to the parents of the victims''.

It may be recalled that on November 12, the court had sentenced to death three persons Kishori Lal, Budh Prakash and Mohammad Abbas to death for their role in the murder of three brothers during the riots.

Castigating the police, Dwivedi said in the order, ``This genocide could not have been possible but for the inaction/connivance of the police.'' He pulled up the police stating that had also connived with the rioters and ``neither did they try to prevent arson or murders nor were they willing to set the machinery of law in motion with the honest intention of booking the guilty and thus made the situation still worse for the victims.''

Dwivedi said ``I think the case falls in the category of rarest of rare cases as four young boys were burnt alive in front of their mother without any provocation.''

He said, ``Killing of innocent people in communal riots to my mind must fall in the category of `rarest of rare cases' not only because of the headless brutality inflicted on the victims for no fault of theirs but also because it amounts to subversion of one of the basic features of the constitution, namely secularism''.

The statements of Harbai Singh, mother of the deceased and wife of Laxman Singh, Nanki Bai consistently stated that Jagga and Manu had assaulted the four brothers and then set them on fire after pouring petrol on them.The defence counsel could not elicit any material contradictory to these allegations, the judge observed.

He said,``The testimony of Harbai and Nanki Bai regarding the circumstances under which four boys were killed is quite clear, consistent and credit worthy.'' `'They could possibly have no motive whatsoever to implicate the accused persons falsely particularly when there is no history of enmity', he said.

Special public prosecutor A B Tandon submitted before the court to pass maximum sentence prescribed by the law as the crime was perpetrated against the entire community.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.