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| Politics over Bhullar | | Badal sends a wrong message | |
IT is perfectly legitimate for the
family members and support
ers of Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar to explore all options available under the law to secure the commutation of his death sentence. A second mercy petition is being moved to the President. The government has announced a medical examination of Bhullar. All this is acceptable. What is not acceptable is the Chief Minister of Punjab playing politics over a legal battle between the State and a convicted terrorist. A backlash or a threat to law and order from a hanging is no excuse to stop it. Even if Bhullar gets relief on merit during the legal process, and there may be valid reasons for it, the inescapable conclusion would be the Home Ministry acted on the pleadings of Parkash Singh Badal and that the executive could be influenced to scuttle the judicial process. Badal's efforts could earn him and his party the goodwill or votes of a section of society, but it has exposed the head of government to the charge of appeasing convicted terrorists. He has already landed himself in an embarrassing situation. On the one hand, his government is defending police officers facing trial for excesses committed during the days of militancy; on the other, it is rushing to the rescue of terrorists. The affidavit filed by the Badal government in the Supreme Court in defence of DGP Sumedh Singh Saini, targeting Bhullar in particular, exposes Badal's double standards. The Chief Minister cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. The BJP is a strong votary of death sentence for terrorists. But to stay in power in Punjab, it keeps either silent or offers a muted response when the state Chief Minister and Home Minister take up terrorists' cause. The state Congress is ambivalent even though Bhullar's target was its then Youth Congress chief. Public opinion against death penalty is growing in India and much of the civilised world. However, politicians seeking clemency for death row convicts in Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and Tamil Nadu have seldom seriously raised the issue of abolishing capital punishment in Parliament. |
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