news details |
|
|
| Executing Guru: Congress' delaying tactics | | Salman & Headley | | EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Jan 27: External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid on January 23 expressed disappointment over the US' refusal to extradite Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist David Headley, who was convicted by Chicago court in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks which resulted in 166 deaths, including the death of six Americans. Headley, who will now spend 35 years in an American jail, was one of the masterminds of the Mumbai carnage. It was he who had done the real groundwork in Mumbai.
Reacting to the US decision not to handover Headley to India for trial, Khurshid said New Delhi would "continue with its demands though it understands that America has to adhere to its legal structure". "Well it is disappointing, undoubtedly it is disappointing but we understand that they have a legal structure which has to be adhered to. We were anxious and we were wishing that the trial takes place here (in India) but it has taken place there (in US)" so that Headley could be punished for his role in the 26/11 attacks, he said, adding that "the country was always firm that people involved in the attacks should be punished". He also said that the extradition of Headley to India will enable it to bring Headley to justice in the real sense of the term. He almost echoed the views of Congress
national spokesperson Rashid Alvi that the Congress wanted Headley to be sentenced to death like Ajmal Kasab who, along with other LeT terrorists, executed the attacks. Kasab was sent to the gallows in the Yerawada Jail, Pune, last November.
It is difficult to share the views as expressed by Khurshid and Alvi on the American decision not to concede the Indian demand seeking extradition of Headley, as also their view that the Government of India and the Congress party are for a very stringent and moral producing action against Headley. It appears they simply tried to hoodwink the nation which wants all the perpetrators of the Mumbai attack, including Headley and Hafiz Saeed, to be brought to justice at the earliest so that their hurt feelings are assuaged and Pakistan shown the place it rightfully deserves as a terrorist and rogue state.
That the Government of India and the Congress party are not really committed to what they have saying could be seen from their unwillingness to execute terrorist Afzal Guru, convicted in the 2001 Indian Parliament terror attack case. The attack had been executed jointly by the LeT and JeM. Seven members of the security forces, including one female constable, had died. Had our security forces not resisted the attack and confronted these terrorists, Guru and his other dreaded associates would have succeeded in eliminating our top leadership.
Mohammad Afzal Guru, also as Afzal Guru, was a Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) terrorist and was sentenced to death by the highest court of the country, Supreme Court of India, in 2004. Had the UPA Government respected the outraged sensitivities of the nation and the judicial verdict, Guru would have been sent to the gallows on 20 October 2006. It was an open and shut case. He was arrested on December 12, 2001 along with Shaukat and a few days later explosives were found from their hideout in Delhi.As many as eighty witnesses were examined for the prosecution and ten were examined for defense. The Supreme Court judgment, among other things, said: "The incident, which resulted in heavy casualties, has shaken the entire nation and the collective conscience of the society will be satisfied if the capital punishment is awarded to the offender". It is important to note that on December 19, 2001, he had confessed his involvement in the attack, which was recorded and was duly signed by him. Not just this, he had also confirmed that he made the "confessional statement without any threat or pressure". Earlier, he had made an appeal to the Delhi High court, which dismissed it saying "the Court found that the conviction of Afzal Guru (by the trial court) was safe…"
Ever since 2006, the authorities in the South and North Blocks and Rashtrapati Bhawan have been sitting on his mercy petition. On November 16, 2012, President Pranab Mukherjee sent back to the Ministry of Home Affairs seven cases, including the one on Afzal Guru. He wanted Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde to "take a re-look at the Ministry of Home Affairs opinion given during his predecessor P Chidambaram's tenure". On December 10, Shinde told media persons that "he will look at the file after the winter session of the Parliament concludes on December 20". More than a month has lapsed, but he continues to sit on the file, despite the fact that he had told the nation that "he will clear the file within 24 hours after he got the file, as he did it in the case of Ajmal Kasab". It appears that the Congress is adopting delaying tactics and it is this that has been further adding to the anger of the already rather angry nation. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
