Kanishka victims call inquiry report bitter-sweet

Toronto: Despite an inquiry report indicting the Canadian government on Thursday for the 1985 Air India Kanishka bombing and recommending ex-gratia for them, families of the victims were unhappy that the killers will never be brought to justice.
Toronto-based Bal Gupta, who set up the Air India Victims' Families Association soon after losing his wife in the bombing June 23, 1985, was looking relieved for the first time in years after meeting Prime Minister Stephen for 45 minutes on Thursday after inquiry panel head John Major released his report
"Though the inquiry commission has addressed all the mistakes we always believed led to the tragedy, the sore point is that the guilty will never be brought to justice," he said.
A former hydro engineer who moved to Canada in 1968, Gupta said, "Today is a bitter-sweet day. Bitter in the sense that the report confirms our suspicions. Bitter in the sense that 20 years is a little too late."
Mississauga-based Lata Pada, the most famous Indian artist in Canada who lost her husband and two daughters in the bombing, told IANS, "Though the report does some justice to us, the sad part is that there will never be conviction of the killers."
She said, "There will never be closure to their tragedy. But the report has at last acknowledged that it was a Canadian tragedy, that the Canadian system failed us."
18/06/10 Indo-Asian News Service/Hindustan Times

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Categories: Air India - International Jun 2010, Foreign Jun 2010, NACIL Jun 2010, Safety Jun 2010