National

Sena's Bane

Raj Thackeray gets a CBI summons in the Kini case, even as the Bombay riots cases return to haunt the ruling party

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Sena's Bane
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A clean sweep in the civic elections is reason to be happy. But as the ruling Shiv Sena-BJP alliance faces the state budget session beginning this week, the controversies are back in focus and need accounting. Two things, at the outset, that don't look positive for the Shiv Sena: the re-appearance of the Kini case; and the insistence of the Srikrishna Commission, inquiring into the Bombay riots of 1992-93, that some key files be made public. These are files that explain why the state government withdrew riots-related criminal cases against Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray.

Another thing that can embarrass the ruling parties is the likelihood of Chief Minister Manohar Joshi having to depose before the Commission, giving evidence and being examined under oath on issues connected to the riots, while the legislature is in session. Not a rosy prospect for the Sena. Little wonder, then, that Thackeray chose the March 14 (the Sena-BJP regime's second anniversary) press conference to make not-so-veiled threats. "It is a commission appointed by the government and the government has the right to dissolve it. We had dissolved it, but we were asked to restore it and we did." (This happened last year, when the Sena chose this course rather than open itself to embarrassment before the Lok Sabha poll. The Commission was restored just before the United Front Government took over.) But it is the Kini case—involving Raj Thackeray, the Shiv Sena chief's nephew—that is proving a bigger headache.

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The CBI investigation is now drawing to its "final stages" and Raj, among three or four important leaders left to be interrogated, has been summoned. The CBI chose a Sunday (March 16) to call Raj to its Mumbai headquarters for questioning, in line with the high degree of secrecy it has maintained all through. After receiving the summons, Raj initiated a flu-rry of legal consultations, anticipating a new line of interrogation. After all, the agency and its New Delhi team aren't as well disposed to Maharashtra's ruling family as the state CID which earlier handled the case. For a while, as the CBI team from Delhi returned to base, the Kini case drifted into a list of election issues in a tepid Congress campaign. But Opposition leader Chhagan Bhujbal, who led the attack against the Thackerays, is currently holding fire. "We won't do much more till the CBI comes up with something. We're waiting. This session, anything may happen." Ramesh Kini, a resident of Matunga in north-central Mumbai, was found dead in a Pune theatre on July 23, 1996. His widow Sheila has since led a fight for justice alleging that Kini was murdered after a protracted effort to evict him from his flat. The charges drew in Kini's landlord Laxmikant Shah, son Suman and family friend Raj Thackeray. Two post mortem reports with differing conclusions and a heap of loose ends immersed the case in mystery.

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Bal Thackeray maintains that his nephew has been "unnecessarily" dragged into the case. Such general statements of support are proving to be little solace. Though the Sena chief recently conferred the mantle of succession jointly on his nephew and son Uddhav, the civic elections have shown that degree of kinship pays. Uddhav was seen in the forefront, organising, campaigning and selecting candidates.

Thackeray, as usual, blames the media and the Opposition for projecting differences between his son and nephew, especially after the civic polls. But the fact that the son has risen while the nephew's fortunes are dipping has not escaped noticed. "Raj is likely to become the sacrificial goat.

He is dispensable, and is being distanced," says a BJP leader from Mumbai. If the Kini case looms large as the lid on Raj's political coffin, law and justice have become the bane of his uncle's life. Old cases keep resurfacing to haunt him and fresh ones have kept him in the judiciary's line of fire. Thackeray, talking to reporters on March 14, would have preferred not to be drawn into his usual anti-judiciary vitriol. But he barely managed to keep himself in check: "I don't understand law much and my lawyers ask me to keep quiet, but there are some things I can't tolerate about the judiciary..."

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The feeling must be mutual after Thack-eray, at a Dussehra rally last year, alleged that a judge had sought a bribe from a litigant in return for a favourable verdict. He repeated the allegation in Vidarbha, and a local businessman sued him for contempt of court. The Nagpur bench of the Mumbai High Court accorded the Sena chief a two-week jail sentence—if carried out, the sentence would have caged Thackeray for a second time after 28 years—but allowed him to appeal to the Supreme Court. Last month, the apex court stayed the order but asked the Sena chief to pay the Rs 4,000 fine imposed by the High Court.

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A criminal case registered against him and 24 Shiv Sainiks for an attack on the offices of the Marathi eveninger Mahanagar in October '91 had him dodging the court's summons with a variety of excuses—including ill health and his wife's death anniversary. Finally, last month, he had to appear in court on the insistence of the additional chief metropolitan magistrate, who found that "ill health" had not prevented Thackeray from attending social and political functions.

Then, his infamous role in the Bombay riots, mostly relating to the communally inflammatory statements he made that are believed to have further fuelled the bloody riots. Last September, the state government withdrew these cases. It claimed privileges against making public the reasons for doing so, saying the files relate "to the affairs of state" and their disclosure would not be in public interest. Justice Srikrishna doesn't seem inclined to accept this claim.

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His unyielding stand—he has put off  the chief minister's deposition till the files are made public—has landed the Sena in a spot. "The more they resist, the greater the suspicion. We would like to know the reasons for letting off Thackeray. One individual can't commit a crime and get away with it," says Yusuf Muchhala, who represents the All India Milli Council before the Commission. With the victims in no mood to let go, Thackeray and his party are caught in a never-ending legal bind.

To be sure, the civic poll success and the inroads made into Congress pockets in the zilla parishad polls that followed have gift-wrapped Maharashtra's endorsement of the Shiv Sena-BJP government as a second birthday gift. But these achievements are more related to Congress listlessness, and may not help the ruling combine surf over all the legal trouble.

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