BOMBAY, 17 August 2006 — Due to fear of reprisals and threats made by the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), lawyers are not coming forward to defend the 10 Muslims that have been accused of July’s Bombay train blasts.
Lawyers that had initially filed court papers to say they were defending two of the accused in the case from Bihar later mysteriously disappeared. The attitude of lawyers in the current Bombay case is totally different to the behavior of lawyers in the court case that followed the 1993 serial Bombay bomb blasts, where several lawyers were able to represent the accused without fear of fundamentalist groups such as the Shiv Sena.
Sunil Gupta, a lawyer from south Bombay, said that lawyers were reluctant to take up the current case after the MNS President Raj Thackeray warned of dire consequences if any lawyers represented those who have been accused.
Thackeray has come under severe criticism from lawyers across India for intimidating legal representatives and for denying the accused basic human rights. The right-wing MNS president’s comments are seen to be totally at odds with the very foundation of justice and equity on which India was founded. A fortnight ago, lawyers brought the inappropriate radical comments of Thackeray to the advocate general of Maharashtra.
In another development, the Federal Agriculture Minister and President of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Sharad Pawar urged his party workers to fight “saffron parties” that were trying to cause communal tension.
Addressing members of the NCP ahead of civic polls, Pawar asked them to be wary of “communal forces” in the city that were trying to capitalize on the Bombay terrorist attacks. He said that these people were trying to exploit the situation and divide society on communal lines.
Pawar urged NCP workers to keep the communal forces at a distance and strengthen the secular alliance. “It is preferable and more important to work with like minded secular parties, even at the cost of losing a few seats.” he said.
The State Finance Minister Jayant Patil, said that Bombay had a cosmopolitan image worldwide, and any development in Bombay had ramifications at the international level. Patil also disclosed that the NCP has declared its alliance with the Congress for the civic polls, and it was for the Congress to respond.
