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1984 riots : Bachchan says he can't recall Tytler at Teen Murthi Bhavan

by India Blooms News Service 05 Jun 2015, 06:53 am

New Delhi, June 5 (IBNS) Amid a renewed controversy over Congress leader Jagdish Tytler's alleged role in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, the CBI has told a court that actor Amitabh Bachchan does not recall if Tytler was present at Delhi's Teen Murti Bhavan on November 1, 1984, media reports said.

Tytler's alibi against allegations of his involvement in the murder of three Sikh men on that day in Pul Bangash area of the capital is based on the statement that he was constantly present at Teen Murti Bhavan, where the body of the slain Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had been kept for public tributes.

Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards on October 31 that triggered a wave of anti-Sikh violence across the country from the next day.
 
 About 3,000 Sikhs were killed in Delhi alone. .


In April 2013, a court re-opened the case against  Tytler and two months later the CBI recorded Amitabh Bachchan's statement at his Mumbai home, as  Tytler had produced television footage that showed him next to the actor at Teen Murti Bhavan.

According to NDTV,  Bachchan's page-long statement states that  he had no recollection of  Tytler being at Teen Murti Bhavan that day. He also said he knows who  Tytler is as someone who he had seen with Sanjay Gandhi, Indira Gandhi's younger son, and also that he had met him a few times.

 Bachchan said he recalled seeing other dignitaries who came to pay their respects to Mrs Gandhi, like RK Dhawan and Gautam Kaul, but not Tytler.
 

The BJP has meanwhile demanded an investigation into the allegation of an arms dealer Abhishek Verma that  Tytler had told him he received a clean chit in the riots case after he met former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.