New Delhi, 20 August (H.S.): Former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar, who was serving a life sentence in connection with the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case, died at a Delhi hospital on Thursday. He was 80.

Kumar, who was lodged in Tihar Jail, was taken to Safdarjung Hospital after his health deteriorated. Doctors at the hospital declared him dead on arrival.

The 1984 anti-Sikh riots erupted following the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards, Satwant Singh and Beant Singh, on October 31, 1984. In the aftermath, armed mobs targeted members of the Sikh community in several parts of Delhi and elsewhere. More than 3,000 people were killed across the country, with the national capital accounting for the majority of the deaths.

Kumar was convicted in a case relating to the deaths of five people during violence in the Palam Colony area of Delhi on November 1 and 2, 1984, shortly after Gandhi's assassination.

The Delhi High Court found Kumar guilty and sentenced him to life imprisonment on December 17, 2018. He was subsequently lodged in Tihar Jail to serve the sentence.

Kumar had challenged his conviction and sentence before the Supreme Court, where his appeal was pending at the time of his death.

His death comes after decades of legal proceedings in cases related to the 1984 violence, which remains one of the most contentious chapters in India's post-Independence history.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar