Act now

There is nothing like double standards for stifling moral values and nowhere do such values fall victim as often as in politics. So it comes as no surprise that the Congress should be twisting and turning to escape the fall-out of the Nanavati Commission report on the massacre of almost 4,000 Sikh men, women and children in Delhi in the first days of November 1984, following Indira Gandhi's assassination.

All citizens of Delhi at the time saw how the police had vanished from the scene; it is also clear that the riots and killings were not uncontrolled excesses, as often happens in a communal riot.

These therefore had the character of a pogrom in which the administration had a hand""just as in Gujarat three years ago. Yet the shameful fact is that, after two decades, no one has been found guilty.

The Congress has now tried hard to lose another opportunity to atone for this sorry record""but has been forced to reconsider because of strong criticism, and Mr Tytler has belatedly resigned.

It took three days for the army to be called out""and the army had to find its way around the streets because the police would not guide them. What most people don't know is that the home minister of the time, P V Narasimha Rao, advised the just-inducted Rajiv Gandhi (who was inclined to call out the army on October 31 itself) not to act straightaway because he would then be remembered as a Prime Minister whose first act was to call out the army. Rajiv listened because he was inexperienced. But what about the others who were in the administration?

The Nanavati Commission's brief, among other things, was to ascertain if some senior politicians belonging to the Congress had been responsible for the killings. It was obvious that after such a long time it would not come up with a smoking gun.

Even so, in the case of Jagdish Tytler, it has said that there was high probability of his involvement. Mr Tytler has said that he was not in Delhi when Mrs Gandhi was shot on October 31.

But the killings took place during November 1-3. In any case when a retired judge of the Supreme Court, with an extensive background in criminal law, comes up with such a finding the government cannot brush the matter aside on the grounds that probability is not enough. Does this mean it needs incontrovertible proof?

In that case we may as well review the entire jurisprudence on criminal law, where suspicion is enough to warrant arrest. The same holds for the other three, Sajjan Kumar, HKL Bhagat and Dharm Das Shastri.

After such a long time, the issue is not merely one of legal niceties; it is largely of morality. The government cannot be indifferent to the needs of justice, which must be seen as having been done. Unless the Congress grasps this essential point, it will do untold damage to its claims of being secular.

People will far more readily believe the BJP charge that Congress secularism is hollow and hypocritical, designed to serve political ends and no more. Indeed, the muted response of the Left, which spares no opportunity to blare out its secular credentials, will also come under suspicion.