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You are here: Home / Archives for Ram Jethmalani

Petition by eminent personalities urges President to pardon Yakub Memon

July 27, 2015 by Nasheman

Yakub Memon

New Delhi: Leaders of various parties including BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha and its expelled MP Ram Jethmalani, eminent jurists and persons from different walks of life today submitted a fresh petition to President Pranab Mukherjee requesting him to waive off the death sentence of Mumbai blasts convict Yakub Memon.

In the new petition urging stay against imminent execution of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon, the signatories claimed that there are “substantive and fresh grounds” that can be considered on merits.

Memon is scheduled to be executed on July 30 as per the execution warrant issued by TADA Court.

The petition has come at a time when there is a huge political controversy over Memon’s hanging and the BJP has condemned the remarks by parties against the hanging of Memon saying such a defence is happening due to “petty politics”.

BJP MP Sinha, who had a day before met and praised Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, has once again gone against the party’s stand on the Memon issue.

In the 15-page petition, the signatories have cited varioius legal points and international committments to argue that Memon should not be hanged.

“We most humbly request your Excellency to consider the case of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon and spare him from the noose of death for a crime that was master-minded by someone else to communally divide the country.

“Grant of mercy in this case will send out a message that while this country will not tolerate acts of terrorism, as a nation we are committed to equal application of the power of mercy and values of forgiveness, and justice. Blood letting and human sacrifice will not make this country a safer place; it will, however, degrade us all,” the signatories said.

Besides Sinha and Jethmalani, those, who have signed the petition include MPs like Mani Shankar Aiyar (Congress), Majeed Memon (NCP), Sitaram Yechury (CPI-M), D Raja (CPI), K T S Tulsi and H K Dua (nominated) and T Siva (DMK), former CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat, CPI(ML)-Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya, Brinda Karat (CPI-M) and filmmakers and actors like Naseeruddin Shah and Mahesh Bhatt, M K Raina and Tushar Gandhi.

It also included various academicians, members of the legal fraternity, activists and retired judges – Justice Panachand Jain, Justice H S Bedi, Justice P B Sawant, Justice H Suresh, Justice K P Siva Subramaniam, Justice S N Bhargava, Justice (retd) K Chandru, and Justice Nagmohan Das, noted lawyer Indira Jaising.

Others include academicians like Irfan Habib, Arjun Dev, D N Jha, and social activists Aruna Roy, Jean Dreze and John Dayal.

They cited that India is a signatory to an international commitment to abolish death penalty and hence death penalty cannot be imposed in India.

“Yakub Memon was not given advance notice of the death warrant hearing and as a result of which he and his lawyers could not participate and contest the issuance of the death warrant. Lack of hearing makes the present death warrant void,” they said, citing a Supreme Court decision in the May 2015 Shabnam versus Union of India and Others case.

They said that there are some very “disturbing” aspects of this case which make the award of death sentence to Yakub Memon as “grossly unfair, arbitrary and excessive”.
“Yakub Memon has served more than 20 years in prison since his arrest. His trial took 14 years to complete. While the Supreme Court used this long period of incarceration as a mitigating circumstance to commute the death sentences of the other 10 co-accused persons, it applied a different yardstick to Yakub.

“The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that lengthy incarceration during pendency of appeal in death cases is a significant mitigating circumstance which ought to be considered in determination of sentence. In the interests of justice we request you to give due importance to this,” they said.

They also argued that Memon is mentally unfit for execution as he has been suffering from schizophrenia for the last 20 years.

“His mental condition has been certified by jail doctors. Schizophrenia as a mental illness has been held by the Supreme Court to render a convict unfit for execution,” they said.
They have also cited that commutation of death sentences of convicts in other terror cases like late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.

“It is also worthwhile to note that death sentences imposed on the aides of Veerappan (convicted and sentenced to death under TADA), Rajiv Gandhi killers and Devender Pal Singh Bhullar have been commuted recently by Supreme Court.

“While the mercy petitions of Verappan’s aides, Rajiv Gandhi’s three killers and Devender Pal Singh Bhullar were decided belatedly by the President, thereby giving them the claim of delay jurisprudence, the Home Ministry has moved swiftly to reject Yakub Abdul Razak Memon’s mercy’s petition,” they alleged.

The petitioners said that it seemed that “subjective factors” were the basis of decisions which lead to arbitrary actions.

They also argued that the death sentence has been awarded under TADA which was repealed.

“Memon has been tried and sentenced to death under TADA, a special law which was repealed by Parliament on account of it having been used to target minorities,” they said and referred to a Supreme Court judgement, which according to them doubted the legality of prosecutions pursued after the repeal of TADA.

“Given the highly compromised rule of law credentials of TADA, executing Yakub Memon will perpetuate the dark legacy of this law,” they said.

(PTI)

Filed Under: India Tagged With: Pranab Mukherjee, Ram Jethmalani, Shatrughan Sinha, Yakub Memon

Met Dawood Ibrahim in London, he wanted to return to India: Ram Jethmalani

July 4, 2015 by Nasheman

Ram Jethmalani

New Delhi: Senior advocate Ram Jethmalani on Saturday claimed to have met Dawood Ibrahim in London, where the underworld don had told him that he was willing to return to India.

Speaking to news agency ANI, Jethmalani rejected a newspaper report, which claimed that he had met Dawood’s close associate Chhota Shakeel in London.

The senior Supreme Court lawyer maintained that Dawood had offered to surrender to Indian authorities, but the then Maharashtra chief minister Sharad Pawar had rejected the offer.

However, Jethmalani said that saying no to Dawood’s proposal wasn’t only Pawar’s decision, but the UPA government was also a part of it.

While recalling his encounter with the underworld don, Jethamalani said that Dawood was ready to return to India and be placed under house arrest during the trial, as he feared he would be bumped off in jail.

Jethamalani further said that Dawood told him that he was not involved in 1993 Mumbai serial blasts and wanted a guarantee from Indian authorities for his return that he will not be subjected to third-degree torture by the police during his detention.

The senior lawyer’s claim comes after Dawood’s trusted aide Chhota Shakeel in an interview to The Times of India, said that the underworld don had wished to return to India after the Mumbai blasts and had even spoken to Jethmalani in London, but the Indian government refused.

The newspaper reported that Shakeel had met Jethmalani in London and put forward Dawood’s proposal for the Indian authorities.

(Agencies)

Filed Under: India Tagged With: Dawood Ibrahim, Ram Jethmalani

My respect for you ends now: Ram Jethmalani 'breaks up' with Modi

June 9, 2015 by Nasheman

jethmalani_modi

New Delhi: Noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani on Monday announced his “break-up” with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said his “diminishing respect” for Modi has “ended”.

The expelled BJP MP, who had strongly supported Modi’s prime ministerial bid, had been opposed to the appointment of former CBDT chairman K V Chowdary as Chief Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) and said he will now fight the government in Supreme Court after his appointment was cleared by the President on Monday.

“Now we shall fight out in the Supreme Court and the court of the people of India. My diminishing respect for you ends now,” Jethmalani wrote in a letter to Modi.

Expressing strong reservations over the move to make Chowdary as next CVC, he had written to President Pranab Mukherjee and Modi, questioning his credentials.

He posted the communication on Twitter and called it “My break-up with Prime Minister Narendra Modi”.

My breakup with the Prime Minister @narendramodi pic.twitter.com/8xmiPCKVAu

— Ram Jethmalani (@RamJethmalani5) June 8, 2015

(PTI)

Filed Under: India Tagged With: K V Chowdary, Narendra Modi, Ram Jethmalani

BJP backtracks on black money, Ram Jethmalani accuses it of shielding the corrupt

October 18, 2014 by Nasheman

jethmalani_modi

New Delhi: BJP did a volte face on the black money stashed away abroad by telling the SC that could not disclose the names of those who have deposited money in banks abroad, citing double taxation avoidance treaties with other countries.

It said that as per this law it cannot make public the names that were disclosed by foreign banks. The move has drawn flak from the opposition Congress party, which was criticised for taking the same position during the United Progressive Alliance regime. During its Lok Sabha poll campaign, the Bharatiya Janata Party had promised to recover undeclared money kept by Indians in overseas banks if elected to power.

Its stand was made in an application seeking modification of an earlier court order asking it to disclose the names all such people it had received from German government to the petitioner Senior counsel Ram Jethmalani.

Jethmalani who slammed the previous government said that the current government was trying to shield the rich and corrupt.

“Matter should not be entertained even for a day. Such an application could only be made by crooks who have illegally parked their ill-gotten money abroad and not by a democratically elected government,” Jethmalani said, adding that Centre is trying to protect the people who have stashed black money in foreign banks.

Global Financial Integrity, a Washington-based think-tank, has estimated that Indians had salted away $462 billion (about Rs. 28 lakh crore in current exchange rates) in overseas tax havens between 1948-2008. A study by industry body Assocham says nearly $2 trillion or Rs. 120 lakh crore of Indian black money is stashed overseas. Assocham’s black money estimate is more than the country’s nominal GDP, which stood at Rs.114 lakh crore or $1.9 trillion in 2013-14. Jethmalani claims that around Rs 70 lakhcrore is stashed in foreign banks.

He said that he has written a letter to Prime Minister on this issue and his response is awaited.

Interestingly, the apex court had earlier rejected the same stand taken by UPA government, observing that such DTAA does not prevent the Centre from disclosing the names of the persons having bank accounts in foreign banks.

The Congress, for its part, demanded an apology from Mr. Modi for misleading the nation. Accusing the BJP and Mr. Modi of “political dishonesty”, Congress spokesman Abhishek Singhvi said the stand taken by the government in the Supreme Court earlier in the day was basically a repetition of what the former Finance Minister, Pranab Mukherjee, had said in the past.

“At that time, he was shouted down by the BJP” and its supporters like Baba Ramdev and Kiran Bedi, Mr. Singhvi said. Why is one government’s inaction on black money alright while another government was ridiculed for it?”

Filed Under: India Tagged With: Abhishek Singhvi, Baba Ramdev, BJP, Black Money, Congress, Narendra Modi, Ram Jethmalani, UPA

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