Sikh pair cleared over Air India terrorist attack
After a two-year trial, a Canadian judge acquitted Ripudaman Singh Malik, aged 58, and 55-year-old Ajaib Singh Bagri of murder and other charges relating to the deaths in 1985 of 331 people.
British Columbia Supreme Court Justice Ian Josephson said key witnesses were not credible.
On June 22, 1985, Air India flight 182 departed from Toronto in Canada, bound for New Delhi in India with 329 people on board.An hour before, a bomb intended for another Air India flight exploded in Narita airport, killing two baggage handlers.
A bomb on Flight 182 was primed to explode on the runway at Heathrow during a re-fuelling stop. However, there was a delay of over two hours before take-off.
The bombings were the deadliest terrorist strike before the September 11 attacks and were Canada’s worst case of mass murder.
Every year the relatives of those who died in the terrorist attack return to Ireland to pay their respects at the memorial sundial which was erected after the crash at Ahakista in west Cork.
Mr Malik sat impassively while the verdict was read, wiping his beard with a scarf. Supporters slapped his son on the back.
Prosecutor Robert Wright maintained that the bombing was revenge by Sikh separatists for a deadly 1984 raid by Indian forces on the Golden Temple at Amritsar.
Mr Bagri, described in court as a “militant Sikh terrorist,” gave a speech that urged the killing of Hindus in the drive for a separate Sikh state, Mr Wright said.
In a July 21, 1984, speech at Madison Square Garden, Mr Bagri allegedly said: “Until we kill 50,000 Hindus, we will not rest.”
However, Mr Justice Josephson dismissed the credibility of prosecution witnesses, including a woman who said Mr Malik told her of a plan to smuggle two bombs on flights from Vancouver that would be transferred to two Air India jets. Reporters were barred from identifying any of the witnesses.
A third man in the case, alleged bomb-maker Inderjit Singh Reyat, pleaded guilty on February 10 to one count of manslaughter and was jailed for five years.
