Presenter, Peter Sissons, ITN with reporting from Ken Rees in Delhi, including interview of Maneka Gandhi by Jane Corbin.

“Violence continued against Sikhs in India. The new Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi affirmed that the Sikh sect cannot be held responsible for the assassination of his mother. He said that he did not believe any sane Sikh would commit such a heinous crime. And in another move to win back the confidence of the Sikhs, he announced that the families of those killed in the violent backlash against them would receive Rs10,000. That’s about £700 for each victim.

The official estimate of the number of Sikhs killed has now risen to a thousand. Unofficial estimates put it many times higher. And the full horror of the onslaught on them is only now becoming clear. Thousands have sought protection in special camps. Too frightened to go home.

Peter Sissons, ITN

From one of these, Ken Rees has sent this report. It was filmed yesterday by an ITN crew but delayed by an Indian government clampdown on satellite communications.

We travelled to a refugee camp outside Delhi. The police had strict orders not to let us in despite pleas from some of the Sikhs inside. Eventually we did get in. It was a large college building, now home to thousands of terrified Sikhs living in squalor. They fled here from many miles around and told her stories of how they’d hid in places like drains and fields to avoid the rioting before eventually reaching safety. This man was a victim of the riots who survived an attempt to burn him alive. His wife tries to comfort him. We saw many more like this who lived. But many died and their widows were mourning today.

We could not move in the courtyards without bumping into or tripping over people. Many were washing outside in gutters in the road. Sikhs placed great store on cleanliness and their religion calls for an uncut beard and long hair. many had their heads shaved by the mobs. You see, I used to look like this, said Mr. Puran Singh. His identity card showed a proud bearded man. Now he has no beard and a shorn head.

The Government wants to destroy us, they told us. They were eager to talk about the situation. ‘We are homeless, we are family less and moreover, above all, no safety. We can’t imagine how we’ll survive ourselves in this India.’

Ken Rees report for ITN

The camps are guarded by Indian troops and police. There are at least three in the Delhi area alone. At another, just three miles away, a food lorry had arrived. The Sikhs angrily told us that they themselves had arranged it.  From the government, there’s almost nothing they said. And certainly we noticed a great shortage of food, water and other essentials.

Many of the Sikhs claimed that police had stood by and watched and even encouraged the rioting. And we ourselves had seen police look idly on during last week’s anti Sikh riots in Delhi.

A relief worker in this camp showed us his list of dead and injured. He’d compiled it after talking to people in just one block. The list contained hundreds of names. We were told stories of dreadful horror. Mothers whose children had been killed wept as they spoke.

Ken Rees, ITN

This was the story of just one six-year-old boy we met in the camp.

Can you tell us what happened to this boy?
Petrol was sprinkled on him and set on fire.
He was set on fire? Why?
Because he’s a sardarji, that’s a Sikh.

Ken Rees, ITN

Who would do such?

His mother looked on. She was two dazed to speak. The Indian government is telling everybody that the situation is normal. There’s nothing to worry about. Indeed claiming that many of the reports of trouble were grossly exaggerated. But at two camps today, we’ve seen something like 20 or 30,000 people, many of them living in appalling conditions. Some are suffering from terrible injuries. They’re now homeless and they think friendless as well.

The assassination of Mrs Gandhi and the violence that followed mean the Indian general election, which would probably have taken place in January, may now be delayed. Mrs Gandhi herself would have had a hard fight. And so, despite the sympathy vote, will the new Prime Minister and leader of the Congress Party, Rajiv Gandhi. He might even have trouble winning his chosen constituency of Ameti in Uttar Pradesh because his opponent there will be his sister-in-law Maneka Gandhi, the widow of his brother Sanjay. Sanjay died in 1980 in a plane crash at the age of 33. He’d already been active in politics and was being groomed to succeed his mother. In 1983, his widow Maneka formed her own political party using her dead husband’s power base after she’d fallen out with Mrs Gandhi. Her opposition party, called the National Sanjay Platform is planning to field seventy candidates in the election. They’re expected to do reasonably well. Maneka’s political opposition to the Gandhi family has been brought into even sharper focus by the fact that she is a Sikh.

Jane Corbin met her at her home in Delhi yesterday and asked her if the inexperienced Rajiv could manage the transition of power from his mother.

There already has been a pretty smooth transition if you bar about 10,000 people killed.

Maneka Gandhi

But I think from the point of view of the government, it was a very smooth transition. It may not have been from the point of view of the people. I don’t think he saw anything wrong in it. I don’t think his party saw anything wrong in it.

Do you see anything wrong in it?

No. I have an Indian, there’s an Indian saying ‘jaise praja, vaise raja’. ‘How the people are, so will the king be’. So if the people are happy, that’s fine.

And do you think he will be the best leader for the country?

I don’t know. He has to begin being a leader first. I mean, I have no doubt that if he begins being a leader, just the very fact of beginning in itself will lead to something. He has to get better. He may be inexperienced now but I’m sure he’ll pick up experience along the way.

How much is he depending on his mother’s name? A hundred percent. at the moment. The entire party is depending on his mother’s name. 100%.  It’s a very powerful name, much more so now. Maybe if Mrs. Gandhi had been alive, not maybe, it’s a fact if she had been alive then the Congress would have lost this election.”

Jane Corbin interviews Maneka Gandhi, 5 November 1984, while Ken Rees reports on the horror of the relief camps.