Does the sidelining of H.K.L. Bhagat in recent years not mean that the Congress party has atoned for its sins of 1984?
A. Hardly. It is true that in the very different situation they have found themselves in since they lost power at the Centre in 1996, Congress party leaders have generally been more receptive to the idea that they are accountable for the 1984 Delhi massacre. Congress president Sonia Gandhi even expressed an apology to the Sikhs for that episode. But all this is just posturing in a bid to strengthen their claim to be secular and a contrast to the communal BJP. In reality, there has been no sign of any penitence in the Congress leadership. No Congress leader has so far made a clean breast of how the massacre was organised and how all manner of overt and covert efforts were made to shield the culprits over the years. The sidelining of Bhagat who is now close to 80 is meaningless. Given his senility and ill-health, Bhagat is hardly in a position to be active in the competitive politics of the Congress party. What really counts is that even after he was widely accused of engineering violenc
