India's Sikh rights group has urged the government to render justice to thousands of Sikh women raped during anti-Sikh riots following the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1984, reported local daily the Hindu on Monday.

This followed nationwide mourning for the 23-year-old medical student who was gang raped in Delhi two weeks ago and died two days ago in a Singapore hospital.

Rights group Sikhs for Justice, while sending its"deepest condolences" to the family of the Delhi gang rape victim, has questioned the silence of the administration, politicians and the justice system over the rape of women of the Sikh community 28 years ago.

During the 1984 riots, Delhi public buses were used to transport squads that raped Sikh women, said the group.

The Dec. 16 Delhi gang rape took place on a moving bus, when six thugs raped and brutalized the victim for half an hour before throwing her and her boyfriend onto a remote road in south Delhi.

Responding to Congress President Sonia Gandhi's statement that as a woman and mother, she could understand the protesters' emotions, the Sikh group wondered if she had conveniently forgotten the"vicious cycle of rape and murder let loose against Sikh women in 1984 at the behest of her husband (former PM Rajiv Gandhi)."

Why did she or Prime Minister Manmohan Singh never visit the hundreds of Sikh victims languishing in"Widow Colony"just a few miles from the parliament of the country, it asked.