Chandigarh, August 27: Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh today has refuted all the allegations about the involvement of the Congress in the Anti-Sikh Riots in 1984. Speaking in the Punjab Assembly and later to the media, Captain Singh clarified that only people were involved in orchestrating the riots and not the Party.

He also said that Former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was not in Delhi when the riots took place. The Chief Minister said, “The incident took place when Indiraji was killed, at that time Rajiv Gandhi was at an airport in Bengal. There was no Congress involvement other than some people. I have named few people, Sajjan Kumar, Dharamdas Shastri, Arjun Das and two more people.”

Today, on the day of the monsoon session, the Punjab Assembly witnessed chaos over the issue. Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) MLA’s attacked the Congress for killing the innocent people during the riots. The SAD MLA’s also walked out of the assembly over the issue. Union Minister Harsimrat Kaun Badal also slammed the Punjab chief minister for his stand on the issue. She said that as a Sikh Captain Singh should be ashamed of himself for supporting the culprits.

On Saturday, addressing the UK parliamentarians and local leaders, the Congress president Rahul Gandhi termed it as a tragedy and a painful experience, but at the same time, he added that the Congress was not involved in them.

During his address, he said, “I think any violence done against anybody is wrong. There are legal processes ongoing in India, but as far as I’m concerned, anything done that was wrong during that period should be punished and I would support that 100 per cent.” His statement triggered a political fight.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Aug 27, 2018 05:54 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).