'Nandita Did Not Understand What Was Being Argued'

10-10-2006

Dear Mr. Gonsalves,

You appeared for accused Md. Afzal before the High Court of Delhi at thehearing of the Death Reference in which Md. Afzal and two others had beensentenced to death.

I watched with admiration the manner in which you defended your client. It isall the more creditable that you agreed to appear for him in the first instanceand in the second place you did an honorary job. It was a very unpopular causeand many stalwarts had refused to represent him.

You acted at the request of a Human Rights Organization and your junior Nityain the case. I believe she had appeared in the Trial Court too. You have actedin the best tradition of the Indian Bar and everyone should be proud of yourperformance.

I have with me the final summary of your submissions which you made to theHigh Court running into nearly 250 pages. I have preserved it for my educationand the education of the young lawyers who keep coming to my Chamber fortraining in the art and practice of advocacy.

I can only imagine the amount of industry that must have gone into thepreparation of this massive volume and the enormous energy that you used in yourspeeches as to the High Court over a long period of almost three months.

I write this because I have been distressed to learn that Ms. Nandita Haksar,an advocate has appeared before the media and made statements against you whichhave no content of truth at all. She is reported to have said that you didnothing for your client except to tell the Court that he deserves a lethalinjection. The impression that she has created is that you made no effort toprovide any legal assistance to your client.

While I cannot believe that Nandita has made these false statements withmalice against you, I cannot but think that they are totally and recklesslyfalse.

I remember your argument that the provision of our criminal law whichsanctions death by hanging is a cruel and unusual punishment and isconstitutionally impermissible. If this argument had succeeded there was noprovision left for executing the death sentence. You were only suggesting to theCourt that there are more humane methods of carrying out the death sentence anda lethal injection is one of them. You never suggested to the Court that yourclient is guilty but he should be given such an injection. I am quite sureNandita did not understand what was being argued. It may be that she was wronglyinformed by somebody else. Please forgive her.

I was quite impressed about by your eloquent argument supported by extractsfrom the record that your client did not get a fair trial. I regret that thisargument did not succeed with the High Court. I am not sure whether it waspursued in the Supreme Court. It should have been and might well have produced awelcome result.

I do want that you should help Md. Afzal in his family's Petition invokingthe presidential powers under Article 72 of the Constitution of India. Thatwould raise your stature and will certainly add to the reputation of our legalsystem.

With warm regards

Yours sincerely,

Sd/-

(RAM JETHMALANI)