rediff.com: 'PM asked me to prevent Thackeray's arrest'

Former Union law minister Ram Jethmalani Monday claimed he made the controversial statement about the illegality of Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray's arrest only after Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee asked him to "do everything possible" to avert the arrest.

"I met Vajpayee on June 19 and wanted to discuss so many problems -- chief justice of India's refusal to administer the oath of office to the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission chairman; something about Attorney General Soli Sorabjee and my proposals about judicial reforms. But the discussion was only on Bal Thackeray," Jethmalani told PTI.

"I said Atalji you have to take a political decision as in my view the case (Bal Thackeray's) is hopelessly time barred and the arrest would be malafide," the former law minister recalled.

Jethmalani said the prime minister told him that it was his decision that the law minister should "do everything possible to see that Thackeray is not arrested."

"When I made the public statement to that effect, the idea was to frighten the Maharashtra government. We could not have actually acted on those lines as we have burnt our fingers by superceding governments (Bihar) before," the former minister said.

Jethmalani said it was the prime minister's duty to support his minister for the remarks which made the Supreme Court react sharply.

Referring to the controversy over the appointment of retired judge, Justice B M Lal, as the MRTPC chairman, Jethmalani said: "The Prime Minister should have taken a stand and told the CJI - I am sorry, my minister is right."

"Had that been so, I would have amended the rules which made it mandatory that the oath of office to the chairman be administered by the chief justice," he said.

On his sacking, Jethmalani said the prime minister does not owe him an explanation, "but this is a very, very unfair way of dealing with a minister."

Referring to the need for harmonious relation between the judiciary and the executive, cited by the prime minister as the reason for his sacking, Jethmalani said it would give rise to grave implications.

"First of all, it will make it very easy for a chief justice to get rid of an inconvenient minister and it will be easy for a prime minister to use the chief justice to get rid of a minister," he said.


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