Who were the actual people on the ground, involved in the killings, lootings and rapes during the massacres of 1984?

By overtly campaigning on an anti-corruption ticket in the December 1984 election, Rajiv Gandhi was implicitly admitting that his ruling Congress Party had a serious problem with fraud and arrogance.1

It was known that he wanted to clean up his mother’s party and rid it of ‘hooligans’ and purana papi – ‘old sinners’ in Hindi, which is shorthand for corrupt politicians. However, owing to his mother’s centralised reign, and the subsequent atrophying of the party organisation, unsavoury characters who could help muster the vote and intimidate rival parties had still to be relied upon in the 1980s.2

It has been asserted that the mobs who wrought destruction in November 1984 were mobilised by Congress-sponsored criminal gangs drawn in particular from Delhi’s outer resettlement colonies where much of the most devastating violence occurred.3

Some colonies like Trilokpuri had arisen during the Emergency when slum-dwellers – who had been evicted from the capital’s jhuggi-jhopri (huts and shacks) clusters as part of a slum-clearance drive led by Sanjay Gandhi – were rehoused there.4

In all, half a dozen slums were razed and their lower caste inhabitants – comprised primarily of ‘untouchable’ Hindu, but also some Muslim, factory labour, casual shop workers and the selfemployed such as rickshaw pullers and hawkers – were forcibly re-located. Though these areas lacked water, electricity or proper drainage facilities, the provision of land and small concrete houses uplifted the perceived status and conditions of their new residents. This translated into a solid support base and vote bank for Indira Gandhi and the Congress Party.5

In the case of their Sikh inhabitants, they had been already living on the sites of the resettlement colonies in what were effectively shanties. They predominantly hailed from the working-class Labana Sikh community whose Rajput ancestors were originally involved in salt trading, weaving string cots and transportation during the days of the British Raj. They had primarily migrated from Sindh to Rajasthan after Partition and, by the late 1960s they had begun resettling around Delhi in areas such as Trilokpuri, Nangloi, Sultanpuri, Geeta Colony, Patparganj and Mangolpuri. When the resettlement colonies were developed, the Sikhs found themselves living alongside the erstwhile slum-dwellers.6

These areas were ripe for exploitation by Congress who supported the local underworld financially, mobilising them when needed particularly during elections.7 This toxic combination – Congress corruption, organised criminality and poor, illiterate potential mercenaries – helps explain the ease with which well-organised armed mobs were rallied so quickly. And it was clear that someone had mobilised them and given assurances that they would not face prosecution. How else could they have done what they did in daylight and so boldly in front of witnesses?8

Some of those who participated were identified by survivors as hailing from the ‘scheduled’ castes – those ‘untouchable’ groups that have historically faced severe social and economic disadvantage – such as Chamars and Bhangis, the lower caste or Dalits. Others, such as some of the local police, identified themselves with these communities, whilst a small number of poor Muslims were also known to have taken an active role in the atrocities.9

The motivation for looting, raping and killing was driven in part by their hatred of Sikhs in more affluent areas.10 Gujjar and Jat farmers, who had become prosperous overnight after having sold their land to the government to establish the resettlement colonies, now saw an opportunity to steal back their plots. For many, payment was forthcoming from gang masters and politicians, and there was always the opportunity for looting.11

Yet they could not have acted without a degree of support – implicit and explicit – from members of the middle-classes from the majority community, who either participated in, or ignored, the mass murders taking place under their noses. Some are even reported to have revelled in what they regarded as deserved punishment meted out to Sikhs.12

Surviving film footage of the massacres, primarily shot by UK media organisations such ITN and BBC, lends credibility to this claim. From the recordings, thousands can be seem roaming the streets to hunt down Sikhs. Judging from their attire, they appear to come from all strata of Indian society. In the central and southern Delhi suburbs, members of the middle classes can be seen attacking Sikhs publicly on the streets. One commentator even recalled seeing an image of the owner of an elite boutique ‘directing a gang of arsonists with his golf club’.13 Another accused middle-class Hindus of having ‘nearly complete sympathy with the killing and lynching of Sikhs’.14

While much of the violence in Delhi appears to have been conducted by villagers living on the capital’s outskirts who had been transported into Sikh neighbourhoods by criminal gangs, the killers were not always strangers. Some victims have spoken of the deplorable complicity of some of their own neighbours.15

Satpal Kaur of Nand Nagri witnessed the murders of both her parents and brother. Neighbours, who had assured the family that they would be protected, later arrived with a mob. They locked the family in their house and, one by one, exterminated them all.16

In some instances, neighbours permitted Sikh women to seek shelter but refused to allow any men. Somti Bai and her family hid in the house of a local politician in Trilokpuri. While he initially assured her that her sons were safe, he subsequently threw them out. All three sons were killed.17

Other neighbours passively observed. An attack on an elderly man and his son in the middle-class colony of Shankar Garden in West Delhi was watched by swathes of neighbours from rooftops but no one was willing to intervene. After initially escaping the father took shelter in a neighbour’s house, which then came under attack. On fleeing through a back exit he was caught by the mob who stoned him. His son was also caught and torched.18

An anthropologist who worked with the widows of the massacres soon after the violence had abated found that in one housing block in Sultanpuri, communities protected one another, whereas in another block residents had turned on their Sikh neighbours. ‘Neighbours did not help,’ one survivor told her, ‘since they were themselves the killers.’19

Nanki Bai, a widow from Kalyanpuri, was adamant that all the attacks in her locality were committed by her neighbours.

It’s all lies that they were outsiders. No one was from outside. They were all from here. We went to the back lane to hide but nobody was willing to hide us. Now of course they’re all saying that they helped a lot. The same people were killing and the same people were doing everything [else].

Uma Chakravarti and Nandita Haksar20

Justifications for the violence included the allegation that Sikhs had overtly celebrated Indira Gandhi’s murder – specifically that they had distributed sweets and danced in jubilation.21 However, human rights activists who recorded interviews with survivors as well as other inhabitants of Delhi, has debunked these arguments. Of those questioned who purportedly ‘knew’ Sikhs had distributed sweets, not one person could give an actual instance of this having taken place. It transpired that on 31 October, some Sikhs were distributing sweets but had done so in anticipation of the coming birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, as was customary. They had stopped when they learnt of the assassination. That same day, Sikh students at Khalsa College in Delhi who had been practicing dance moves also stopped on hearing the news of Mrs Gandhi’s death. Yet, there were no repercussions for wedding processions of the majority community that continued with typical pomp replete with a band that very same day.22

Was there some confusion? Had an ITN news report on 31 October showing celebrations in Southall and Birmingham by some Sikhs, who were distributing sweets, setting off fireworks and drinking champagne, been attributed to those in Delhi? The Indian government was clearly aware of the broadcast as they had sent a message the next day to the British government expressing how they and the people of India were ‘both indignant and distressed’ by the scenes. Speaking to the press about these concerns before her departure to attend the funeral of Indira Gandhi, Margaret Thatcher condemned the ‘outrageous behaviour of a tiny minority’ of Sikhs in Britain who ‘gloated’ over her murder.23

As commentators were quick to point out, nothing could justify the massacres – all Sikhs could not be held responsible for the actions of a few.24 In a television interview on 1 November, author Khushwant Singh, who had strong Congress leanings, had observed with trepidation how the tide had turned against Sikhs nationwide. The day before he had, on the advice of President Zail Singh, sought refuge to escape the mobs:

For the act of two Sikhs in killing Mrs Gandhi, it would seem that a community of over 13 million Sikhs are being held to ransom.

Khushwant Singh, author. ITN. 2 November 1984.25

Rahul Roy, who had been a volunteer at the Farsh Bazar relief camp at Shahadra, the largest in Delhi, made a keen observation.

Those who knew they were culpable escaped the tag of being communal by putting the blame on the state. [The] state becomes some amorphous creature which can carry the blame and the people themselves stand exempted [of blame].

Rahul Roy26

Indeed, by holding only government agencies to account, local residents who joined the ranks of the death squads could conveniently escape recognition, punishment and even their own sense of guilt.

Some Delhiites such as Shuddhabrata Sengupta, an artist and writer who witnessed Sikh men being burnt alive when he was sixteen, felt a deep sense of anger at what had taken place. He is not alone when he says he has ‘never forgiven this city’.27

Another was journalist Sanjay Suri. After Operation Blue Star and the November massacres, fears of a backlash against Hindus in Punjab were always raised but ‘hardly a Hindu was attacked across Punjab. In 1984 I grew proud of Punjab, and ashamed of Delhi’.28

Read more: The People
case study

The ordinary people behind the 1984 Sikh Genocide.

  1. 1984: Rajiv Gandhi wins landslide election victory, On This Day, BBC. ↩︎
  2. James M. Markham, ‘Anti-Sikh whirlwind: where did it come from?’, The New York Times, 16 November 1984. ↩︎
  3. Who are the Guilty? Report of a joint inquiry into the causes and impact of the riots in Delhi from 31 October to 10 November 1984. Gobinda Mukhoty, Peoples Union of Civil Liberties and Rajni Kothari, Peoples Union of Democratic Rights. November 1984, p3. ↩︎
  4. Shalini Narayan, ‘Trilokpuri: once upon a riot’, The Indian Express, 2 November 2014. ↩︎
  5. Shashi Tharoor, India from Midnight to the Millenium, 2012, p 250. ↩︎
  6. Shalini Narayan, ‘Trilokpuri: once upon a riot’, The Indian Express, 2 November 2014. ↩︎
  7. Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985. ↩︎
  8. Sanjay Suri, 1984: The Anti-Sikh Violence and After, 2015, p 75. ↩︎
  9. Who are the Guilty?, 1984; Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985. ↩︎
  10. Lional Baixas, ‘The Anti-Sikh Pogrom of October 31 to November 4, 1984’, SciencePro, 9 June 2009. ↩︎
  11. Stanley J. Tambiah, ‘Reflections on Communal Violence in South Asia’, in Kamala Visweswaran (ed), Perspectives on Modern South Asia: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation, 2011, p.181; Who are the Guilty?, 1984, p 3. ↩︎
  12. Dr Rajni Kothari, ‘Genocide – 1984: the how and why of it all’, Angelfire, 1994. ↩︎
  13. Ashis Nandy, ‘The Politics of Secularism’, in Veena Das (ed), Mirrors of Violence, 1990, p 89, quoted in Cynthia Keppley Mahmood, Fighting for Faith and Nation, 1996, p 143. ↩︎
  14. Ashish Banerjee, ‘Comparative Curfew: Changing Dimensions of Communal
    Politics in India’, quoted in Cynthia Keppley Mahmood, Fighting for Faith and Nation, 1996, p 141. ↩︎
  15. Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985. ↩︎
  16. Jarnail Singh, I Accuse… The Anti-Sikh Violence of 1984, 2011, p 102. ↩︎
  17. Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985 ↩︎
  18. Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985 ↩︎
  19. Veena Das, Life and Words: Violence and the Descent into the Ordinary, 2007, p 157. ↩︎
  20. Uma Chakravarti and Nandita Haksar, The 1984 Archive ↩︎
  21. Cynthia Keppley Mahmood, Fighting for Faith and Nation, 1996, p 141. ↩︎
  22. Madhu Kishwar, ‘Gangster Rule’, Manushi, 1985 ↩︎
  23. Margaret Thatcher’s disgust at Sikhs-1984, funeral of Indira Gandhi, Youtube, posted by ‘Sikh2Inspire’, 3 February 2014. ↩︎
  24. Dharma Kumar, The Times of India, 15 November 1984, cited from Pranay Gupte, Mother India: A Political Biography of Indira Gandhi, 2009, p 94. ↩︎
  25. Khushwant Singh, author. ITN. 2 November 1984. ↩︎
  26. Anshu Saluja, ‘Shadows of 1984: Exploring the Communal Question’, Social Action, 65, 2, 2015. ↩︎
  27. Harsh Mander, ‘Delhi’s indifference to 1984 riots led to other massacres’, Hindustan Times, 13 December 2014. ↩︎
  28. Sanjay Suri, 1984: The Anti-Sikh Violence and After, 2015, p 185. ↩︎

Who were the ordinary people, involved in killing Sikhs during the 1984 Sikh Genocide?