A Report on Shocking Revelations
Shocking revelation of Rajiv’s assassination
It is with the tragic assassination of former Prime Minister of India Mr. Rajiv Gandhi that the real face of the deep seated threat to the national security posed by long term and wider conspiracy came to lime light. But unfortunately, the reputed investigation agencies of the nation along with judiciary, succumbing to the acutely misguided public opinion and shoddily influenced by a long hatched conspiracy ended up naming few innocent individuals as being solely responsible for an unprecedented event demeaning national security.
This carefully orchestrated exercise in the guise of an investigation on the behest of the real murderers is trying to execute a few innocent civilians to sidetrack the attention of the entire nation away from the real conspirators of the murder. The initial actions from judiciary went on with the summary execution of all the 26 accused until it was stopped from doing so by the Supreme court of India following heavy criticism from legal experts terming it as ‘Judiciary’s Genocide’. Yet we are not far from a haze, biased and unfair investigation climate.
It is with great pain that we witness the greatest tragedy of our century that a great nation is being deceived that the hanging of a few innocents will save the nation from the clutches of cold-blooded anti-national conspirators and keep it safe and secure. The question remains, if the civilized society will ever wake up to the hard facts which are being hidden from public view with strenuous effort, only to save the real conspirators?
If the responsible and respected media of the nation reduce itself to a silent spectator, the nation will witness a judicial nightmare by hanging innocent civilians and saving real culprits, thus letting an anti-national conspiracy gain momentum posing a bigger threat to the security of the nation. The society and media will have to regret their inaction deeply in a day when the real conspirators go about executing their plan of destabilizing this nation of a billion people. We sincerely hope this does not become the situation.
There have been examples from the past for the media stepping in to bring a de-railed investigation back to track. Yet a daring reinvestigation by the media in this issue will be celebrated for ages as an unprecedented achievement by media in uncovering a massiveAnti-national conspiracy. Hence we sincerely urge the reputed media of this nation to roll up their sleeves and get into action by reinvestigating the bigger conspiracy and save the nation from its toughest threat till date by identifying the real conspirators behind the murder. There is no doubt that the entire nation will stand with the media in every step of its attempt to open up the deeper conspiracy spiraling the nation Key questions that raise suspicion on the fairness of SIT’s trial
1. The first natural question that comes to anyone who has been following Rajiv’s case is the strange unexplained reason as to why the entire investigation which ran for years need to be held under top secrecy. Most of the politically important cases of our time have been conducted in an open court letting the public and media witness the way in which the trial is being carried out. This becomes very important, given the fact that this trial is not about the killing of an individual but is about the threat against our national security.
2. The 50-day long opposition arguments blasted the SIT’s so-called evidences to ground demonstrating that they all are ‘cooked up’ storied to fit the prejudices of SIT. The SIT never bothered to respond to such a serious and substantiated claim against them. Instead they chose to intimidate and silence the opposition.
3. The unorthodox and unplanned visit by Rajiv to Sriperumbudur which was not in Tamilnadu Congress’s plan books was never investigated.
4. Rajiv’s experienced Security Officer O.P.Sagar gave a strange ‘miss’ to the flight with Rajiv to Chennai. This is stranger considering the long delay introduced by the flight’s technical snag which forced Rajiv to turn back to Circuit house and come back later to take his flight.
5. Unidentified Bulgarians claiming to be TV reporters accompanied Rajiv all along his campaign but ensured at all instances to ‘not-attend’ any of his public meetings. Isn’t it strange that TV reports who travelled so far missed the chance to records videos of a top leader’s public meetings. They later disappeared to nowhere, never to be seen again or to be interrogated.
6. Two unidentified women boarded Rajiv’s car near Ramapuram (enroute Sriperumbudur from airport) and they too disappear into thin air after the assassination, never to be found or interrogated. What forced the SIT ignore these strange events?
7. Except for the fact that some of the assassins are born in Yarlpanam and one of them had taken a photograph with Prabhakaran once upon a time, what made SIT believe they are/were LTTE operatives? Except for the promise that SIT did hear a telephonic conversation between Sivarasan and Pottu Amman (which again was not produced as a recorded evidence), what links Prabhakaran to this murder?
8. The assassination of Padhmanaba which happened in the same period as that of Rajiv’s, did not enroll Prabhakaran even as one of the accused while in Rajiv’s case he is the prime accused. Why would SIT add him to this case except to inject a ‘life’ to their allegations or to appease their controllers?
9. Why did SIT not consider the clearly reported facts that the assassins were heavily aided by Congress leaders in their entire process starting with Margaret Alwa (former General Secretary of Congress) forcing Renganathan to rent the house to Sivarasan and Latha Priyakumar breaking Security barriers for Dhanu and taking her to the most comfortable position to kill Rajiv and then ask Latha Kannan to help her further?
a. Marakatham Chandrasekar, mother of Latha Priyakumar who helped Dhanu and who declined to comment on Rajiv’s discussion with the foreigners though having travelled in the same car was never enquired
b. Vinothini who is Marakatham Chandrasekar’s daughter in law and the daughter of Jayawardene was at the site of assassination was not enquired even once. This is one of the key challenges posed by against SIT by opposition’s senior lawyers
c. Latha Kannan who stopped Rajiv from was walking towards the dais and created the necessary time delay for Dhanu to perform the assassination was never interrogated
d. Not even a single Congress leader was near Rajiv during the blast, though they have been fighting to stick around closer to him in all other public meetings.
10. Why SIT was never able to consider the fact that the Sinhalese & Srilankan government are pitched sharply against Rajiv for India’s involvement in their internal affairs through IPKF?
a. Congress peers could have seen him as a clear hurdle to their growth for having landed directly at PM’s seat only because of being Indira’s son
b. BJP could never come back to power as long as he is alive. Why they were not considered as a possible conspirator while the assassins had a place of origin with strong affinity to Hinduism?
Verma Commission’s Findings
1. Verma commission heavily criticized serious security lapses introduced by police & intelligence wings of state, central governments and also by Congress leaders
2. Ministerial committee which was instituted to review findings of Verma commission did not analyze any such aspects but quickly winded up after blaming four officers. Much to the demise of legal experts, the investigation against those officers was started long after they retired from service (when they enjoy impunity from any such investigation). The officers as if things have been pre-planned, did not panic. Instead they approached proper legal bodies and got the exceptions from enquiry
3. Credibility of M.K.Narayanan as IB director was questioned in length by Justice Verma for he
a. Rejected to produce original video recordings of the bomb explosion
b. Rejected to agree in writing that he attended the meeting that discussed Rajiv’s security immediately following the announcement of Parliament elections
4. Karthikeyan, the head of SIT also exhibited a suspicious behavior
a. He too rejected to show the original video recordings of the bomb blast even in the last sitting of Verma commission
b. A version presented by him had the last few critical minutes being heavily tampered with making it very haze to arrive at any conclusion
c. He is also reported for having rejected the existence of such a video initially even to an enquiry commission
Jain commission’s Findings
1. Jain commission shared the shock and disbelief of the entire nation when it got a response from the Home Ministry that the file containing original documents related to Verma commission is MISSING
a. A similar disappearance of important documents happened with CBI officer Kumar losing his briefcase full of internationally collected documents in London’s Heathrow airport. He did nothing but file a complaint with London police and was put to no disciplinary action.
2. The obstacles put up by the Congress to the proper working of the Jain commission is multi pronged
a. Attorney General filed a suit that the Jain commission does not have any AUTHORITY to enquire anyone who has been enquired by SIT before
b. It cannot accuse anyone else apart from those accused by SIT as per his claim
c. Law ministry from its part delayed the process by taking a whole year to send a response to Jain’s request for clarification
d. It also tried its best to limit Jain commission’s fair trial process by supporting the claim made by Attorney General
3. But the best of moves from Congress was with the filing of a case in Delhi high court against the validity of the G.O which installed the Jain commission
a. This prompted the HC to bring an interim stay to any enquiry by the Jain commission
b. This only lead to a delay as the HC reassured the powers of Jain commission to operate with independence and anyone it finds fit shall be called for enquiry
c. The Congress in a knee jerk reaction escalated the case to Supreme Court of India. It was rightly caught with the SC questioning its interest in promoting a PIL filed by a so-called individual Delhi Lawyer Mustaq.
d. Congress ended up withdrawing the case showing everyone that it is the Congress that acted as the real hand behind the PIL file by Mustaq. Why would Congress try to stall a legally established enquiry commission?
4. The most successful move by Congress against the Jain commission was with the threat to withdraw the support to IK Gujral government if Jain commission was left to exist anymore.
a. The minority government forced by Congress pulled the plug off the only fair trial mechanism
b. Jain commission was forced to submit a final report in 7 days
c. A minister called up Jain and asked him to present only a high level report and asked him not to present any Action Taken Report (ATR). This would mean that the report is not presented in Parliament and sent to the Secretariat of the respective ministries instead
5. Jain commission withstood the enormous pressure exerted by Congress and presented a detailed 2000 page report explaining the clear links that Chandraswami had with the assassination and SubramanianSwamy’s links with the assassination
6. Justice Jain also wrote to Home ministry about the threat received from various parties and the way SIT tried to intimidate the works of Jain commission
7. Later it came to light that Narasimha Rao in order to save his close friend Chandraswami made the files to disappear
8. The one who performed all these activities on the behest of Narasimha Rao is none other the Home minister P. Chidambaram
The entire process leads to greater suspicions on the activities of the SIT. These questions do remain!
1. Why only sympathizers of Tamil cause alone were interrogated, accused and convicted?
a. All 26 of the accused were Tamils or sympathizers of Tamils, 13 from India and 13 from Srilanka. Yet Tamils who had an anti-Tamil affinity were excused.
b. All 4 of the accused who were condemned to death were Tamils and sympathizers of Tamil cause
c. For example, Perarivalan who was convicted to death was charged that he bought a 9v battery for the assassin. The only evidence was the cash bill (to be retained safely in his pocket when police arrested his months later!) that was supposed to have been given by a road side petty shop. Does any roadside shop in India give a receipt even now for a 5 Rs purchase? How about 20 years before (in 1991), before the invent of computerized billing? While Perarivalan who was watching movie at the time of Rajiv’s death was enquired and finally convicted, Marakatham Chandrasekar and her daughter who helped the assassin to approach Rajiv and were present at the site of assassination left to go free?
2. People who played definite roles were never convicted, accused or even interrogated
3. Apart from the vicious intention in the SIT’s approach, there are also serious human right violations in the way the enquiry was done. SIT’s officer Thiyagarajan infamously indicated by the Kerala HC for turning Sister Abaya’s rape and murder case in to a suicide case was heavily criticized for his credibility as an investigation officer.
a. It is shocking to believe that the Supreme Court’s verdict to hang the accused was based on the confessional statements obtained through brutal tortures by this tainted officer
b. There are lot of evidences to believe that the SIT has been heavily biased by those who were in power
c. This is strengthened by the way in which SIT tried to substantiate a charge against life convict Robert Pias only by quoting that he had intentions to murder Rajiv since IPKF killed his 13 days old child by smashing the infant to the wall. The fact remained that the harmless Pias was taking refuge in India in an attempt to save his other kid
Rajiv Gandhi Assassination - Unanswered questions & unresolved puzzles
At a time when a great nation of a billion people is lead to believe that it has laid its hand on Rajiv’s murderers, we, as dutiful citizens of this country are heavily disturbed by the sheer negligence shown by all sections of the society in trying to understand the highly biased nature and the consequential intricacies of the trial carried on by CBI’s Special Investigation Team (SIT).
Winding the clocks back a little to 1990s and starting our reasoning process from the key deliberations of the opposition arguments in this case that ran for over 50 days, we attempt to portray some of the most shocking and revealing facts that were carefully hidden from the public attention until this very day.
In the hearings starting from the year 1993, this case ran for 50 months with 288 witnesses, 3000 documents from the Public prosecutor and 1000 documents supporting the opposition were presented in the court. The opposition arguments were delivered with a heavy presence of the officers from the Special Investigation Team and the Public prosecutors while the Tamilnadu Police stood guard for the proceedings but all through the investigation a completely secrecy was maintained.
Many of the questions raised during the opposition’s arguments remained unanswered. The way in which the investigation was done by the SIT leads to a suspicion that the investigation has been carefully mended to appease those in power.
Rajiv’s death is not just the murder of a VIP but is a bitter conspiracy that shattered the nation. It is the clear symptom of the deeper plans from the international powers which try to dominate the polity of this nation. That is precisely why these shocking events and the shortcomings in the investigation are very important and need to be analyzed.
The opposition arguments in this case were initiated by senior lawyer Mr. Duraisamy. He, in his initial argument, reportedly blew up all the ‘cooked up stories’ of the SIT before an intently listening court room. In a similar fashion, Mr. Ramadass in his 11 day opposition argument, brought to light many of the ‘made up stories’ in the SIT’s investigation report.
However the climax of the opposition argument came from the harsh elicitations from Mr. Chandrasekar. He, with highly convincing evidences and with a fully emotional flow of statements, blamed the SIT for having cooked the report to fit their preconceived ideas and notions. He went on even to challenge the SIT that, “If the SIT can prove the evidences against my questions, all my accused party men will accept all the claims made against them”. Thus the 50 day opposition argument has raised so many questions, most of the unanswered till date.
For a better understanding of the shortcomings in this investigation, the various strange happenings around the time of Rajiv’s murder have been grouped under few major categories.
1. The unorthodox circumstances leading to Rajiv’s appearance in the Sriperumbudur meeting pops up naturally as the first question.
a. Rajiv started his propaganda from Delhi and reached Chennai through Orissa and Andhra Pradesh. Yet the question remains as to why Rajiv would agree to attend the Sriperumbudur meeting which was not at all in the agenda of Tamilnadu Congress Party?
b. While other Senior Leaders of Tamilnadu Congress like Vazhappadi Ramamurthy and G.K.Mooppanaar showed no interest in bringing Rajiv for propaganda in Sriperumbudur, what made Mrs.Maragadham Chandrasekar to travel to Delhi to invite him? Did she fall prey to a larger conspiracy, unknowingly?
2. The second was with a ‘no-show’ from Rajiv’s security guard at a time when there was a definite threat to Rajiv’s life and the so-called reporters who popped up from nowhere and disappeared to nowhere but have always kept themselves at a safe distance from Rajiv during his Sriperumbudur visit.
a. When Rajiv was making his propaganda rounds in Bhuvaneshwar and Vishakapattinam, it was his Security officer O.P.Sagar who stood guard. Why did not he turn up for Chennai?
b. Unidentified television reporters from Bulgaria accompanied Rajiv in his propaganda. Their primary job was to make video recordings of Rajiv’s propaganda. Though they participated in the initial propaganda rounds of Rajiv in Orissa and Andhra, they chose to skip all of his public meetings. Instead they stayed back in their luxury hotel with the pilot of their special flight in Vishakapattinam. What could be the purpose of their visit if they are not covering his public meetings, which is supposed to be their key job?
c. In Vizag, Rajiv had to turn back to his Circuit House due to a technical snag in his flight. Rajiv returned to the flight after receiving the news through the then Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Vijaya Baskara Reddy that the problem has been solved. In the midst of this mess, the two Bulgarian reporters reached the airport very late along with Rajiv’s Security Officer O.P.Sagar and consequentially missed the flight. Thus the security officer did not fly with Rajiv. What circumstances led an experienced officer like Sagar to miss the flight with Rajiv?
d. Meanwhile Rajiv reached Chennai without his security officer. The security officer who takes charge in Chennai P.C.Gupta who was waiting to receive Rajiv could not receive the Pistol from O.P.Sagar as the later did not come in that flight. As a result, Gupta traveled along with Rajiv with out the pistol.
e. After Rajiv left the Chennai Meenabakkam airport in his motorcade two so-called women journalists boarded Rajiv’s car near Ramavaram. Whether their identity was ever verified by SIT is still a question. Why they were not subjected to any kind of investigation is a bigger question.
f. Where are the Bulgarians? Who are the two foreign journalists and where did they go after the incident?
3. How Pirabaharan and LTTE were linked to this case without any acceptable evidence?
a. Except for the fact that Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan all hail from Yalpanam(Jaffna), what made the SIT believe that they acted only on the behest of LTTE. Why they couldn’t have been hired by any other foreign power for this assassination? Why the SIT investigation around them was concluded only by linking them with LTTE and excluding any other possibility?
b. The SIT’s claim for having overheard a radio conversation between PottuAmman and Sivarasan seems to be an imaginary story built to sustain their stand. What is the proof for this claim?
c. There are many facts that can be derived by comparing Rajiv’s murder with that of Padhmanaba. While the latter’s murder was investigated by the Tamilnadu Q branch police, the SIT investigated Rajiv’s murder. Both the teams point the place of origin of the conspiracy to Yalpanam(Jaffna). While Sivarasan was a prime accused in both the cases, Pirabaharan was not an accused at all in Padhmanaba’s murder. It only leads us to a conclusion that the inclusion of Pirabahran’s name in Rajiv’s murder is not a consequence of any findings of investigation rather it seems to be truly politically motivated. The inclusion was done only with a cruel intention to add ‘life’ to this case.
d. India and especially Tamilnadu are well known vocal supporters and sympathizers of the liberation struggle of Tamils. Given this obvious fact, it will be a historical blunder to kill Rajiv in Tamilnadu and get themselves kicked out of India and face a legal ban, if ever they had such an intention. Will Pirabaharan, the leader of a liberation struggle of its stature be stupid enough to take such a decision?
e. How come an old photograph where Pirabaharan posed alongside Sivarasan is the only solid evidence to prove that Pirabaharan had a hand in this murder?
f. Even if Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan had been with the LTTE earlier. What proves that they were associated with the LTTE at the time of assassination? Why they can’t have moved out of LTTE and acted as paid-assassins for any other Western, European or Indian mafia?
4. The most important question is with the strangest circumstances under which Congress leaders and their family members cleared all the security hurdles and lead the assassins and their aides gain such a close proximity with a former Prime Minister and the running Prime Ministerial candidate Rajiv. (In fact Dhanu was only at arm’s reach when the bomb exploded). This won’t have been possible even for long time Congress workers. This is accompanied by the unnatural silence maintained by Congress leaders about the questions lingering around the strange circumstances of the murder
a. The two so-called women foreign journalists interviewed Rajiv in the car, but Marakatham Chandrasekar who accompanied Rajiv in his car declined to comment stating that she did not know anything about the discussion. Why this strange behavior was not put to any investigation?
b. Maragadham Chandrasekar came to the venue of the Sriperumbudur Public meeting. Her daughter Latha Priyakumar came from Arakkonam along with her husband Lawyer Magendiran. Her son Lalith Chandrasekar came to the venue with his wife Vinothini. But they never revealed where they started from. Given the fact that Vinothini is the very daughter of Julius Jayewardene, why she was never interrogated? When the entire family was at the venue, why no one was ever interrogated?
c. Sivarasan’s mother and Vinothini’s father are Sinhalese. Both of them were at the murder site, why they can’t have acted on the behest of Srilankan Supremo Premadasa who has an apparent apprehension against Rajiv for having sent the IPKF to Srilanka.
d. Rajiv was intercepted on his way to the podium was interrupted for a while by Latha Kannan who read out a poem. It this timeframe, that was utilized by the assassin Dhanu to trigger the bomb. Why she was never included in the list of accused? Dhanu entered the security ring and got so close to Rajiv only using Latha Kannan. If Haribabu could be accused, why not Latha Kannan? Why should the SIT show such a blatantly kind attitude towards people who had a Congress connection?
e. Vazhappadi Ramamurthy, who accompanied Rajiv to the stage in the two street-corner meetings just preceding the Sriperumudur meeting, was too far from Rajiv in this meeting alone. Why is that?
f. Many innocent civilians and security personnel died alongside Rajiv but it is too strange to observe that not even a single Congress worker died or even had a minor injury in this incident?
g. It was considered that Latha Priyakumar brought Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan to Sriperumbudur. More importantly Latha Priyakumar(Daughter of Maragadham Chandrasekar) brought them to the Women’s section and asked Latha Kannan to help them. Why she was never interrogated as to the purpose of letting them have access to former PM?
h. Renganathan testified that he rented the house out to Sivarasan only at the instance of Margaret Alwa. How was she related to Sivarasan? Was the validity of this claim ever verified by SIT?
5. Based on various statements by notable leaders, evidences and prevalent circumstances there are many possible conspirators. It is very strange that the Congress who should have had the biggest interest in uncovering this conspiracy never questioned the SIT for not considering those more probable alternatives?
a. Chandraswamy, Subramania Swamy (both accused by the Jain commission) and arms dealer Kasoki were all possible candidates for interrogation. Was any investigation done considering them?
b. During the Gulf war, India under leadership of Mr.Chandrasekar supplied fuel to the American fighter crafts. Rajiv heavily criticized this and there is every reason for America to be angry at Rajiv. Why there is no investigation done considering the possibility of a CIA hand behind the assassination?
c. Before being killed, Rajiv told that the CIA is responsible for the assassination of then Pakistani Prime Minister Zia-Ul-Huq. What forced him make such a statement? Did he suspect a similar attempt at his life as well by CIA?
d. In the aftermath during July 1991 the then Home Minister S.P.Chavan opined that there are other foreign groups and powers which are behind Rajiv’s assassination. Was any investigation done to assess the reason behind the Home Minister’s statement?
e. CIA, notorious for its interest in the departures of many of the third world leaders was never considered a possible conspirator. Why was that?
f. The leader of Palestinian liberation struggle Mr. Yasar Arafat warned the then PM Mr.Chandrasekar that there is a threat to Rajiv’s life. What was the source of this warning? Was there any investigation done in that direction? Considering the fact that the possibility of Mr.Yasar Arafat receiving any intelligence is possible only if the conspiracy was hatched in the Middle East or the Western Europe, did the SIT investigate such a possibility?
g. If there is one thing that the Srilankan government would share with the LTTE, it is the hatred towards Rajiv for messing up their lives in Srilanka by sending the IPKF. Considering this fact, the opposition lawyer Chandrasekar challenged the SIT that his party would accept all the claims against them if the SIT could prove that Vinothini and her family are innocent and they did not have anything to do in the murder. The SIT safely chose to skip this very important challenge from opposition and hence no one from that family was ever interrogated
h. The Srilankan government would have obviously been threatened by Rajiv’s statement that IPKF will make another visit to Srilanka if he came back to power. Why the possibility that they had an interest in his death, was never considered?
i. Premadasa was popularly blamed for the assassination of many of the political leaders of his time including Kamini Thissanayaka, Adhulath Mudhali and Vikrama Singhe. Why there was no investigation done considering this possibility?
j. Politicians with vested interest or even his party leaders who may find him as a hurdle in their political career could have used assassins to execute Rajiv out of political enmity. Why this angle was never considered?
k. Rajiv as a Prime Minister had close links with so many international weapon dealers. Why they couldn’t have had a hand in this assassination?
We don’t need reputed agencies like the CBI or SIT to conduct the investigation if the end result is only to file a report blaming a few individuals without considering any of the obvious possibilities.
Though we all agree that “not every question turns out to be a fact” But if these strong suspicious circumstances are not investigated there is every chance that the real conspirators protected by powerful groups get away easily. Those real culprits who go uncaught will turn out to be a true threat to the safety of the leaders of this nation.
Did the SIT ever perform an investigation or did they just prepare a report based on mere assumptions?
Verma Commission:
The Verma commission report strongly condemned the Security and Intelligence wings of both the Central and State governments of the time for the serious lapses in the security provided to Rajiv Gandhi.
Both Chandrasekar’s central government and the governor’s rule in Tamilnadu state are popularly considered to be Dummy governments run from under by Congress. The Verma commission blamed not just the Intelligence Bureau, Tamilnadu state government and its Police department but also the Congress party members for their sheer negligence of duty and lack of responsibility. The Verma commission made it very clear that the life of Rajiv could have been saved if they have done their duty properly.
The Ministerial Committee, established to review the Verma commission’s findings, winded up after they recommended disciplinary action against some senior officers who have failed to carry out their duty. The committee conducted face-to-face enquiry with four erring senior officers namely Head of Intelligence Bureau M.K. Narayanan, Home secretary G. Mani Sharma, Defense Secretary Vajpayee and Cabinet Secretary Vinod Pandey.
But the entire exercise is a big eye wash as anyone could understand. These officers were in service when the Verma commission submitted its recommendations, but the enquiry by the Congress Ministerial Committee was conducted after they retired from their service. It is a well managed drama in the guise of an enquiry where the involved Congress leaders are well aware of the fact that no disciplinary action can be taken against a public servant when they are not in service. As expected the involved officers approached legal bodies and got clear exceptions for omitting them for any sort of enquiry. Thus the Congress has clearly, with a meticulous plan, made sure none of Verma commission’s recommendations were implemented and also ensured that the involved officers are not subject to any disciplinary action.
The Verma commission raised very strong suspicions against the credibility of M.K.Narayanan as the Director of IB.
This claim is not without substance. In 1991 after the Parliament election was announced, a meeting was organized by Mr.Bargava –Home Secretary. MK Narayanan also participated in that meeting in which security of Rajiv Gandhi was discussed. Asst. Home Secretary NK Singh told the Verma Commission that MK Narayanan knows the details of Rajiv Gandhi‘s security. But MK Narayanan refused his presence in the meeting. When Verma commission asked both of them to give it in writing about their participation NK Singh gave it in writing confirming his participation, but MK Narayanan refused to give it in writing.
A copy of the original video taken exactly at time of the blast was with the IB director Mr.M.K.Narayanan apart from the one with SIT. Both Narayanan and SIT declined to submit the original video to the Verma commission. The SIT head Mr.Karthikeyan even claimed that no such video recording ever existed, as per the statements recorded in the Verma commission’s reports. Then the commission was reported by Karthikeyan that the video is being investigated by international experts to see if there are any deletions in the video. It is a shocking fact that the original version of the video was never submitted to the commission. Even in the last sitting of the commission’s enquiry process, Mr. Verma insisted on the missing original video. Mr.Karthikeyan maintained the same response that the video is still being investigated by foreign experts.
Verma in his report made it very clear that the video clippings of the final moments of assassination, shown later, where Rajiv was garlanded by Dhanu and when the bomb was detonated have been intentionally highly distorted and tampered with. Justice Verma raised an obvious question as to why the last few seconds of the video alone were blurred.
On 20th May, a day before the execution of Rajiv, the then Joint Director of IB wrote a letter to the Chiefs of all Police departments of all states requesting them to increase the security provided to Rajiv. Did he know that the assassins are closing in on Rajiv? If so why there was no alarm raised to stop this assassination?
Jain commission
1. Justice Jain as a preparatory step for his enquiry decided to set the periphery of the investigation. To enable this, he requested the file containing the original reports from the government that established the Verma commission. In a reply that shocked the entire nation especially Justice Jain, the Home Ministry reported that the file is MISSING.
a. Parliament was engulfed with chaos as members came down heavily on the government for its sheer negligence. A Special team was installed for SEARCHING the file.
b. Probably this is the first event in independent India where a Special Team was formed only to search for a file. The special team after filtering through all possible layers of all the responsible departments of the government includingthe PMO, law ministry and Home ministry ended up with empty hands. The Narasimha Rao government declared that they were not able to find the file
c. This curious case of a critical file missing from the government’s racks stalled the entire enquiry process by a whole year.
2. Later the Congress tried it best to interrupt the operation of Jain commission when it resumed its operation with the Public opinion hearings for the first time.
a. Immediately, in an unbelievable move, the Attorney General of the central government raised questions about the AUTHORITY of the Jain commission. Justice Jain demanded a written clarification from the Law Ministry.
b. The law ministry showing a complete lack of responsibility took a whole year to respond to Justice Jain.
c. In its response the Law Ministry introduced clear hurdles to the commission by ruling that the commission cannot get involved in any of the areas in which the investigation has already been done by the CBI’s SIT. Also it declared that the Jain commission does not have any authority to call for hearing anyone who has appeared before the SIT earlier.
d. Justice Jain refused to accept the rulings of the law ministry and explained that the commission has the right to enquire all aspects of the case when it enquires about the possibility of an ‘external conspiracy’. In a 60 page response to the Law ministry, Justice Jain ruled that the commission has every right to monitor the operations of the CBI and also to enquire any possible shortcomings in the CBI’s operations.
e. The Central government in turn demanded the Jain commission to change its stance to meet the expectations set earlier in the Law Ministry’s response limiting the Jain commission. It also requested to freeze the enquiry for an interim period. Jain strongly rejected any such halting of enquiry.
3. Since the government was not able to contain Jain through intimidation, various legal blockades were created against the commission’s operation.
a. The most important one was with a ‘PIL’ filed by a Delhi Lawyer Mustaq Ahamed challenging to nullify the G.O which installed the Jain commission.
b. He argued that the Jain commission cannot do a reinvestigation of the case or re-enquire the witnesses since the CBI has already done the enquiry and has even submitted its report. He added that if there is anyone else accused apart from those accused by the CBI, it will hinder the course of the case and will have negative reactions.
c. The Delhi high court which accepted the case for further investigation, issued an interim order prohibiting the Jain commission from enquiring anyone who has been a witness or has been issued charge sheet by the SIT.
d. Though the High court which investigated the PIL further, after the detailed hearings, did not find any merit in the case filed by Mustaq and rejected the suit and re-confirmed the authority of the Jain commission to call on any of the witness for a re-enquiry.
4. The Congress, in an obvious knee jerk reaction, came out tearing its own mask in its rush against the Jain commission.
a. The Central Congress government sent the rejected appeal of the lawyer Mustaq to the Supreme Court of India. It was then that the nation was shook by the sheer double standards of the Congress. Congress became the subject to wide suspicion by escalating the PIL filed by an individual, thus stopping the re-assessment of the witnesses of Rajiv’s murder case. Now with this step, Congress ended up getting itself identified in public as the true hand behind the PIL filed by Mustaq.
b. A suspicious Supreme Court questioned the Congress as to why it is promoting the suit filed by an individual. Congress which felt cornered by the questions from Supreme Court decided to withdraw the case filed through an individual and did so proving beyond doubt that it is the central Congress government which led the show from behind the screens and ensured that the credibility of witnesses are not reviewed by the Jain commission.
5. The most obvious and important fact that we learn is that the Congress saw the Jain commission as a clear threat to concealed identity of the politicians who had a definitive role in Rajiv’s murder. The die-hard efforts made by Congress to impede the effective operation of the Jain commission raised serious questions in the minds of the citizens of this country about the interest Congress has against a fair and free trial in the Rajiv assassination case.
6. In spite of all these barriers raised by Congress, the Jain commission did a detailed investigation of the assassination and identified Chadraswami and SubramanianSwamy as people who had definite role in the assassination
a. It pulled up all the intelligence records indicating the international crime links that Chandraswami had since 1987 and also the financial transactions made in international bank accounts involving arms dealers
b. The Jain commission cites the strong apprehension that Chandraswami had motive against Rajiv which has been recorded through multiple eye witnesses. Chandraswami has reportedly vowed to kill Rajiv [``Main usko khatam kar doonga (I'll finish him off),'' ``Jaise uski maain ki maut huie, vaise he Rajiv Gandhi ko marunga (Rajiv Gandhi will be killed the same way his mother was”].
c. However second and more concrete evidence was provided by the Central Board of Direct Taxes which seized original payment drafts made totaling 11 million USD in favor of arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi from Chandraswami ashram.
d. It also opens up the links that SubramanianSwamy had with the assassination.
e. Those documents until then were kept secret by the IB without being submitted to the central government. For the first time in February 1998, the then Secretary of the Jain commission Luthra sent these documents to the central government’s Home Secretary Singh from their secret IB shelves.
7. Though the Jain commission which was setup in 1991 got its life extended for about 12 times, this time in the face of the shocking revelations it has achieved, requested for an extension only by another year to conclude its investigation on the role by Chandraswamy, SubramanianSwamy and other foreign powers.
a. The hung parliament headed by I.K.Gujral was very fragile with Congress being a key contributor to the coalition. The Congress threatened to withdraw support and topple the government if the Jain commission was allowed to continue any further.
b. The government under the heavy pressure from the Congress led its Home Secretariat to inform the commission on 27th February 1998 that the government does not want the Commission to be working anymore and also ordered the commission to submit its concluding report in 7 days’ time.
c. Justice Jain was obviously taken aback by this shocking step from the government in closing down the only avenue open for a fair trial.
8. A senior minister from the Central government made a telephone call to Justice Jain and informed that there is no need to present a detailed report and it is sufficient to submit a high level report. Since the report will be on a very high level it does not have to be submitted in the Parliament and can be sent directly to the respective Ministry’s office. The highlight of the notification from the minister was that the Jain commission does not have to submit an ATR (Action Taken Report)
9. CBI officers also intimidated the commission which was busy preparing the final report of the enquiry. But the key findings of the Jain commission reports have already leaked to the media and all the information available so far are pitched completely against the Congress.
10. The commission went on with compiling the findings of the enquiry in spite of the interferences from the CBI. This lead to serious and prolonged altercations between the CBI officers and the Jain commission members. Justice Jain himself received threatening telephonic calls from many power centers. Jain made a clear mention of these bullying phone calls in his letter to the Home ministry. Witnessed by a flooding media crowd, Justice Jain in his final push against all these odds, presented his 2000 page report to the then Home Minister Indrajit Gupta in 1997.
A week later, Justice Jain who went back to his home town Jodhpur was up for a total surprise. Sonia Gandhi visited him at his home and thanked his for presenting the report.
11. In the aftermath of the storm created by the Jain commission’s findings, Outlook magazine reported on 24.11.1997 that the IB and RAW officers accepted that Narasimha Rao destroyed all the documentary evidences to save his close friend Chadraswamy who was considered as the key conspirator in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.
12. The files were not just made to disappear; they were even edited for their content to fit the view expected by ruling powers. It is against Indian Penal Code to tamper with/edit legal evidences/documents. All these mess happened in Narasimha Rao’s rule.
13. A highly intriguing question arises as to who executed such orders from Narasimha Rao. Luckily we are not here without an answer to this key question. The one who corrected government document and files to fit Narasimha Rao’s wishes was none other than our very own Home Minister who is quite infamous for his recommendations to reject the mercy petitions of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan. Jain commission’s enquiry brought to light, his involvement in tampering with the evidence against Indian Law.
14. A CBI officer Kumar while travelling back from his trip abroad for collecting evidences ‘lost’ his briefcase containing highly critical documents related to the case in London’s Heathrow airport. Who could have possible stolen the briefcase with documentary evidences? Did this happen without his knowledge or was it otherwise? After all this, there is no action taken against this officer. All that he did was to file a complaint with the Heathrow Police before returning to India, empty handed.
Source:
http://realkillersofrajiv.blogspot.in/
contact.may17@gmail.com | www.may17movement.org
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| File Photo: Rajiv Gandhi |
It is with the tragic assassination of former Prime Minister of India Mr. Rajiv Gandhi that the real face of the deep seated threat to the national security posed by long term and wider conspiracy came to lime light. But unfortunately, the reputed investigation agencies of the nation along with judiciary, succumbing to the acutely misguided public opinion and shoddily influenced by a long hatched conspiracy ended up naming few innocent individuals as being solely responsible for an unprecedented event demeaning national security.
This carefully orchestrated exercise in the guise of an investigation on the behest of the real murderers is trying to execute a few innocent civilians to sidetrack the attention of the entire nation away from the real conspirators of the murder. The initial actions from judiciary went on with the summary execution of all the 26 accused until it was stopped from doing so by the Supreme court of India following heavy criticism from legal experts terming it as ‘Judiciary’s Genocide’. Yet we are not far from a haze, biased and unfair investigation climate.
It is with great pain that we witness the greatest tragedy of our century that a great nation is being deceived that the hanging of a few innocents will save the nation from the clutches of cold-blooded anti-national conspirators and keep it safe and secure. The question remains, if the civilized society will ever wake up to the hard facts which are being hidden from public view with strenuous effort, only to save the real conspirators?
If the responsible and respected media of the nation reduce itself to a silent spectator, the nation will witness a judicial nightmare by hanging innocent civilians and saving real culprits, thus letting an anti-national conspiracy gain momentum posing a bigger threat to the security of the nation. The society and media will have to regret their inaction deeply in a day when the real conspirators go about executing their plan of destabilizing this nation of a billion people. We sincerely hope this does not become the situation.
There have been examples from the past for the media stepping in to bring a de-railed investigation back to track. Yet a daring reinvestigation by the media in this issue will be celebrated for ages as an unprecedented achievement by media in uncovering a massiveAnti-national conspiracy. Hence we sincerely urge the reputed media of this nation to roll up their sleeves and get into action by reinvestigating the bigger conspiracy and save the nation from its toughest threat till date by identifying the real conspirators behind the murder. There is no doubt that the entire nation will stand with the media in every step of its attempt to open up the deeper conspiracy spiraling the nation Key questions that raise suspicion on the fairness of SIT’s trial
1. The first natural question that comes to anyone who has been following Rajiv’s case is the strange unexplained reason as to why the entire investigation which ran for years need to be held under top secrecy. Most of the politically important cases of our time have been conducted in an open court letting the public and media witness the way in which the trial is being carried out. This becomes very important, given the fact that this trial is not about the killing of an individual but is about the threat against our national security.
2. The 50-day long opposition arguments blasted the SIT’s so-called evidences to ground demonstrating that they all are ‘cooked up’ storied to fit the prejudices of SIT. The SIT never bothered to respond to such a serious and substantiated claim against them. Instead they chose to intimidate and silence the opposition.
3. The unorthodox and unplanned visit by Rajiv to Sriperumbudur which was not in Tamilnadu Congress’s plan books was never investigated.
4. Rajiv’s experienced Security Officer O.P.Sagar gave a strange ‘miss’ to the flight with Rajiv to Chennai. This is stranger considering the long delay introduced by the flight’s technical snag which forced Rajiv to turn back to Circuit house and come back later to take his flight.
5. Unidentified Bulgarians claiming to be TV reporters accompanied Rajiv all along his campaign but ensured at all instances to ‘not-attend’ any of his public meetings. Isn’t it strange that TV reports who travelled so far missed the chance to records videos of a top leader’s public meetings. They later disappeared to nowhere, never to be seen again or to be interrogated.
6. Two unidentified women boarded Rajiv’s car near Ramapuram (enroute Sriperumbudur from airport) and they too disappear into thin air after the assassination, never to be found or interrogated. What forced the SIT ignore these strange events?
7. Except for the fact that some of the assassins are born in Yarlpanam and one of them had taken a photograph with Prabhakaran once upon a time, what made SIT believe they are/were LTTE operatives? Except for the promise that SIT did hear a telephonic conversation between Sivarasan and Pottu Amman (which again was not produced as a recorded evidence), what links Prabhakaran to this murder?
8. The assassination of Padhmanaba which happened in the same period as that of Rajiv’s, did not enroll Prabhakaran even as one of the accused while in Rajiv’s case he is the prime accused. Why would SIT add him to this case except to inject a ‘life’ to their allegations or to appease their controllers?
9. Why did SIT not consider the clearly reported facts that the assassins were heavily aided by Congress leaders in their entire process starting with Margaret Alwa (former General Secretary of Congress) forcing Renganathan to rent the house to Sivarasan and Latha Priyakumar breaking Security barriers for Dhanu and taking her to the most comfortable position to kill Rajiv and then ask Latha Kannan to help her further?
a. Marakatham Chandrasekar, mother of Latha Priyakumar who helped Dhanu and who declined to comment on Rajiv’s discussion with the foreigners though having travelled in the same car was never enquired
b. Vinothini who is Marakatham Chandrasekar’s daughter in law and the daughter of Jayawardene was at the site of assassination was not enquired even once. This is one of the key challenges posed by against SIT by opposition’s senior lawyers
c. Latha Kannan who stopped Rajiv from was walking towards the dais and created the necessary time delay for Dhanu to perform the assassination was never interrogated
d. Not even a single Congress leader was near Rajiv during the blast, though they have been fighting to stick around closer to him in all other public meetings.
10. Why SIT was never able to consider the fact that the Sinhalese & Srilankan government are pitched sharply against Rajiv for India’s involvement in their internal affairs through IPKF?
a. Congress peers could have seen him as a clear hurdle to their growth for having landed directly at PM’s seat only because of being Indira’s son
b. BJP could never come back to power as long as he is alive. Why they were not considered as a possible conspirator while the assassins had a place of origin with strong affinity to Hinduism?
Verma Commission’s Findings
1. Verma commission heavily criticized serious security lapses introduced by police & intelligence wings of state, central governments and also by Congress leaders
2. Ministerial committee which was instituted to review findings of Verma commission did not analyze any such aspects but quickly winded up after blaming four officers. Much to the demise of legal experts, the investigation against those officers was started long after they retired from service (when they enjoy impunity from any such investigation). The officers as if things have been pre-planned, did not panic. Instead they approached proper legal bodies and got the exceptions from enquiry
3. Credibility of M.K.Narayanan as IB director was questioned in length by Justice Verma for he
a. Rejected to produce original video recordings of the bomb explosion
b. Rejected to agree in writing that he attended the meeting that discussed Rajiv’s security immediately following the announcement of Parliament elections
4. Karthikeyan, the head of SIT also exhibited a suspicious behavior
a. He too rejected to show the original video recordings of the bomb blast even in the last sitting of Verma commission
b. A version presented by him had the last few critical minutes being heavily tampered with making it very haze to arrive at any conclusion
c. He is also reported for having rejected the existence of such a video initially even to an enquiry commission
Jain commission’s Findings
1. Jain commission shared the shock and disbelief of the entire nation when it got a response from the Home Ministry that the file containing original documents related to Verma commission is MISSING
a. A similar disappearance of important documents happened with CBI officer Kumar losing his briefcase full of internationally collected documents in London’s Heathrow airport. He did nothing but file a complaint with London police and was put to no disciplinary action.
2. The obstacles put up by the Congress to the proper working of the Jain commission is multi pronged
a. Attorney General filed a suit that the Jain commission does not have any AUTHORITY to enquire anyone who has been enquired by SIT before
b. It cannot accuse anyone else apart from those accused by SIT as per his claim
c. Law ministry from its part delayed the process by taking a whole year to send a response to Jain’s request for clarification
d. It also tried its best to limit Jain commission’s fair trial process by supporting the claim made by Attorney General
3. But the best of moves from Congress was with the filing of a case in Delhi high court against the validity of the G.O which installed the Jain commission
a. This prompted the HC to bring an interim stay to any enquiry by the Jain commission
b. This only lead to a delay as the HC reassured the powers of Jain commission to operate with independence and anyone it finds fit shall be called for enquiry
c. The Congress in a knee jerk reaction escalated the case to Supreme Court of India. It was rightly caught with the SC questioning its interest in promoting a PIL filed by a so-called individual Delhi Lawyer Mustaq.
d. Congress ended up withdrawing the case showing everyone that it is the Congress that acted as the real hand behind the PIL file by Mustaq. Why would Congress try to stall a legally established enquiry commission?
4. The most successful move by Congress against the Jain commission was with the threat to withdraw the support to IK Gujral government if Jain commission was left to exist anymore.
a. The minority government forced by Congress pulled the plug off the only fair trial mechanism
b. Jain commission was forced to submit a final report in 7 days
c. A minister called up Jain and asked him to present only a high level report and asked him not to present any Action Taken Report (ATR). This would mean that the report is not presented in Parliament and sent to the Secretariat of the respective ministries instead
5. Jain commission withstood the enormous pressure exerted by Congress and presented a detailed 2000 page report explaining the clear links that Chandraswami had with the assassination and SubramanianSwamy’s links with the assassination
6. Justice Jain also wrote to Home ministry about the threat received from various parties and the way SIT tried to intimidate the works of Jain commission
7. Later it came to light that Narasimha Rao in order to save his close friend Chandraswami made the files to disappear
8. The one who performed all these activities on the behest of Narasimha Rao is none other the Home minister P. Chidambaram
The entire process leads to greater suspicions on the activities of the SIT. These questions do remain!
1. Why only sympathizers of Tamil cause alone were interrogated, accused and convicted?
a. All 26 of the accused were Tamils or sympathizers of Tamils, 13 from India and 13 from Srilanka. Yet Tamils who had an anti-Tamil affinity were excused.
b. All 4 of the accused who were condemned to death were Tamils and sympathizers of Tamil cause
c. For example, Perarivalan who was convicted to death was charged that he bought a 9v battery for the assassin. The only evidence was the cash bill (to be retained safely in his pocket when police arrested his months later!) that was supposed to have been given by a road side petty shop. Does any roadside shop in India give a receipt even now for a 5 Rs purchase? How about 20 years before (in 1991), before the invent of computerized billing? While Perarivalan who was watching movie at the time of Rajiv’s death was enquired and finally convicted, Marakatham Chandrasekar and her daughter who helped the assassin to approach Rajiv and were present at the site of assassination left to go free?
2. People who played definite roles were never convicted, accused or even interrogated
3. Apart from the vicious intention in the SIT’s approach, there are also serious human right violations in the way the enquiry was done. SIT’s officer Thiyagarajan infamously indicated by the Kerala HC for turning Sister Abaya’s rape and murder case in to a suicide case was heavily criticized for his credibility as an investigation officer.
a. It is shocking to believe that the Supreme Court’s verdict to hang the accused was based on the confessional statements obtained through brutal tortures by this tainted officer
b. There are lot of evidences to believe that the SIT has been heavily biased by those who were in power
c. This is strengthened by the way in which SIT tried to substantiate a charge against life convict Robert Pias only by quoting that he had intentions to murder Rajiv since IPKF killed his 13 days old child by smashing the infant to the wall. The fact remained that the harmless Pias was taking refuge in India in an attempt to save his other kid
Rajiv Gandhi Assassination - Unanswered questions & unresolved puzzles
At a time when a great nation of a billion people is lead to believe that it has laid its hand on Rajiv’s murderers, we, as dutiful citizens of this country are heavily disturbed by the sheer negligence shown by all sections of the society in trying to understand the highly biased nature and the consequential intricacies of the trial carried on by CBI’s Special Investigation Team (SIT).
Winding the clocks back a little to 1990s and starting our reasoning process from the key deliberations of the opposition arguments in this case that ran for over 50 days, we attempt to portray some of the most shocking and revealing facts that were carefully hidden from the public attention until this very day.
In the hearings starting from the year 1993, this case ran for 50 months with 288 witnesses, 3000 documents from the Public prosecutor and 1000 documents supporting the opposition were presented in the court. The opposition arguments were delivered with a heavy presence of the officers from the Special Investigation Team and the Public prosecutors while the Tamilnadu Police stood guard for the proceedings but all through the investigation a completely secrecy was maintained.
Many of the questions raised during the opposition’s arguments remained unanswered. The way in which the investigation was done by the SIT leads to a suspicion that the investigation has been carefully mended to appease those in power.
Rajiv’s death is not just the murder of a VIP but is a bitter conspiracy that shattered the nation. It is the clear symptom of the deeper plans from the international powers which try to dominate the polity of this nation. That is precisely why these shocking events and the shortcomings in the investigation are very important and need to be analyzed.
The opposition arguments in this case were initiated by senior lawyer Mr. Duraisamy. He, in his initial argument, reportedly blew up all the ‘cooked up stories’ of the SIT before an intently listening court room. In a similar fashion, Mr. Ramadass in his 11 day opposition argument, brought to light many of the ‘made up stories’ in the SIT’s investigation report.
However the climax of the opposition argument came from the harsh elicitations from Mr. Chandrasekar. He, with highly convincing evidences and with a fully emotional flow of statements, blamed the SIT for having cooked the report to fit their preconceived ideas and notions. He went on even to challenge the SIT that, “If the SIT can prove the evidences against my questions, all my accused party men will accept all the claims made against them”. Thus the 50 day opposition argument has raised so many questions, most of the unanswered till date.
For a better understanding of the shortcomings in this investigation, the various strange happenings around the time of Rajiv’s murder have been grouped under few major categories.
1. The unorthodox circumstances leading to Rajiv’s appearance in the Sriperumbudur meeting pops up naturally as the first question.
a. Rajiv started his propaganda from Delhi and reached Chennai through Orissa and Andhra Pradesh. Yet the question remains as to why Rajiv would agree to attend the Sriperumbudur meeting which was not at all in the agenda of Tamilnadu Congress Party?
b. While other Senior Leaders of Tamilnadu Congress like Vazhappadi Ramamurthy and G.K.Mooppanaar showed no interest in bringing Rajiv for propaganda in Sriperumbudur, what made Mrs.Maragadham Chandrasekar to travel to Delhi to invite him? Did she fall prey to a larger conspiracy, unknowingly?
2. The second was with a ‘no-show’ from Rajiv’s security guard at a time when there was a definite threat to Rajiv’s life and the so-called reporters who popped up from nowhere and disappeared to nowhere but have always kept themselves at a safe distance from Rajiv during his Sriperumbudur visit.
a. When Rajiv was making his propaganda rounds in Bhuvaneshwar and Vishakapattinam, it was his Security officer O.P.Sagar who stood guard. Why did not he turn up for Chennai?
b. Unidentified television reporters from Bulgaria accompanied Rajiv in his propaganda. Their primary job was to make video recordings of Rajiv’s propaganda. Though they participated in the initial propaganda rounds of Rajiv in Orissa and Andhra, they chose to skip all of his public meetings. Instead they stayed back in their luxury hotel with the pilot of their special flight in Vishakapattinam. What could be the purpose of their visit if they are not covering his public meetings, which is supposed to be their key job?
c. In Vizag, Rajiv had to turn back to his Circuit House due to a technical snag in his flight. Rajiv returned to the flight after receiving the news through the then Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Vijaya Baskara Reddy that the problem has been solved. In the midst of this mess, the two Bulgarian reporters reached the airport very late along with Rajiv’s Security Officer O.P.Sagar and consequentially missed the flight. Thus the security officer did not fly with Rajiv. What circumstances led an experienced officer like Sagar to miss the flight with Rajiv?
d. Meanwhile Rajiv reached Chennai without his security officer. The security officer who takes charge in Chennai P.C.Gupta who was waiting to receive Rajiv could not receive the Pistol from O.P.Sagar as the later did not come in that flight. As a result, Gupta traveled along with Rajiv with out the pistol.
e. After Rajiv left the Chennai Meenabakkam airport in his motorcade two so-called women journalists boarded Rajiv’s car near Ramavaram. Whether their identity was ever verified by SIT is still a question. Why they were not subjected to any kind of investigation is a bigger question.
f. Where are the Bulgarians? Who are the two foreign journalists and where did they go after the incident?
3. How Pirabaharan and LTTE were linked to this case without any acceptable evidence?
a. Except for the fact that Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan all hail from Yalpanam(Jaffna), what made the SIT believe that they acted only on the behest of LTTE. Why they couldn’t have been hired by any other foreign power for this assassination? Why the SIT investigation around them was concluded only by linking them with LTTE and excluding any other possibility?
b. The SIT’s claim for having overheard a radio conversation between PottuAmman and Sivarasan seems to be an imaginary story built to sustain their stand. What is the proof for this claim?
c. There are many facts that can be derived by comparing Rajiv’s murder with that of Padhmanaba. While the latter’s murder was investigated by the Tamilnadu Q branch police, the SIT investigated Rajiv’s murder. Both the teams point the place of origin of the conspiracy to Yalpanam(Jaffna). While Sivarasan was a prime accused in both the cases, Pirabaharan was not an accused at all in Padhmanaba’s murder. It only leads us to a conclusion that the inclusion of Pirabahran’s name in Rajiv’s murder is not a consequence of any findings of investigation rather it seems to be truly politically motivated. The inclusion was done only with a cruel intention to add ‘life’ to this case.
d. India and especially Tamilnadu are well known vocal supporters and sympathizers of the liberation struggle of Tamils. Given this obvious fact, it will be a historical blunder to kill Rajiv in Tamilnadu and get themselves kicked out of India and face a legal ban, if ever they had such an intention. Will Pirabaharan, the leader of a liberation struggle of its stature be stupid enough to take such a decision?
e. How come an old photograph where Pirabaharan posed alongside Sivarasan is the only solid evidence to prove that Pirabaharan had a hand in this murder?
f. Even if Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan had been with the LTTE earlier. What proves that they were associated with the LTTE at the time of assassination? Why they can’t have moved out of LTTE and acted as paid-assassins for any other Western, European or Indian mafia?
4. The most important question is with the strangest circumstances under which Congress leaders and their family members cleared all the security hurdles and lead the assassins and their aides gain such a close proximity with a former Prime Minister and the running Prime Ministerial candidate Rajiv. (In fact Dhanu was only at arm’s reach when the bomb exploded). This won’t have been possible even for long time Congress workers. This is accompanied by the unnatural silence maintained by Congress leaders about the questions lingering around the strange circumstances of the murder
a. The two so-called women foreign journalists interviewed Rajiv in the car, but Marakatham Chandrasekar who accompanied Rajiv in his car declined to comment stating that she did not know anything about the discussion. Why this strange behavior was not put to any investigation?
b. Maragadham Chandrasekar came to the venue of the Sriperumbudur Public meeting. Her daughter Latha Priyakumar came from Arakkonam along with her husband Lawyer Magendiran. Her son Lalith Chandrasekar came to the venue with his wife Vinothini. But they never revealed where they started from. Given the fact that Vinothini is the very daughter of Julius Jayewardene, why she was never interrogated? When the entire family was at the venue, why no one was ever interrogated?
c. Sivarasan’s mother and Vinothini’s father are Sinhalese. Both of them were at the murder site, why they can’t have acted on the behest of Srilankan Supremo Premadasa who has an apparent apprehension against Rajiv for having sent the IPKF to Srilanka.
d. Rajiv was intercepted on his way to the podium was interrupted for a while by Latha Kannan who read out a poem. It this timeframe, that was utilized by the assassin Dhanu to trigger the bomb. Why she was never included in the list of accused? Dhanu entered the security ring and got so close to Rajiv only using Latha Kannan. If Haribabu could be accused, why not Latha Kannan? Why should the SIT show such a blatantly kind attitude towards people who had a Congress connection?
e. Vazhappadi Ramamurthy, who accompanied Rajiv to the stage in the two street-corner meetings just preceding the Sriperumudur meeting, was too far from Rajiv in this meeting alone. Why is that?
f. Many innocent civilians and security personnel died alongside Rajiv but it is too strange to observe that not even a single Congress worker died or even had a minor injury in this incident?
g. It was considered that Latha Priyakumar brought Dhanu, Subha and Sivarasan to Sriperumbudur. More importantly Latha Priyakumar(Daughter of Maragadham Chandrasekar) brought them to the Women’s section and asked Latha Kannan to help them. Why she was never interrogated as to the purpose of letting them have access to former PM?
h. Renganathan testified that he rented the house out to Sivarasan only at the instance of Margaret Alwa. How was she related to Sivarasan? Was the validity of this claim ever verified by SIT?
5. Based on various statements by notable leaders, evidences and prevalent circumstances there are many possible conspirators. It is very strange that the Congress who should have had the biggest interest in uncovering this conspiracy never questioned the SIT for not considering those more probable alternatives?
a. Chandraswamy, Subramania Swamy (both accused by the Jain commission) and arms dealer Kasoki were all possible candidates for interrogation. Was any investigation done considering them?
b. During the Gulf war, India under leadership of Mr.Chandrasekar supplied fuel to the American fighter crafts. Rajiv heavily criticized this and there is every reason for America to be angry at Rajiv. Why there is no investigation done considering the possibility of a CIA hand behind the assassination?
c. Before being killed, Rajiv told that the CIA is responsible for the assassination of then Pakistani Prime Minister Zia-Ul-Huq. What forced him make such a statement? Did he suspect a similar attempt at his life as well by CIA?
d. In the aftermath during July 1991 the then Home Minister S.P.Chavan opined that there are other foreign groups and powers which are behind Rajiv’s assassination. Was any investigation done to assess the reason behind the Home Minister’s statement?
e. CIA, notorious for its interest in the departures of many of the third world leaders was never considered a possible conspirator. Why was that?
f. The leader of Palestinian liberation struggle Mr. Yasar Arafat warned the then PM Mr.Chandrasekar that there is a threat to Rajiv’s life. What was the source of this warning? Was there any investigation done in that direction? Considering the fact that the possibility of Mr.Yasar Arafat receiving any intelligence is possible only if the conspiracy was hatched in the Middle East or the Western Europe, did the SIT investigate such a possibility?
g. If there is one thing that the Srilankan government would share with the LTTE, it is the hatred towards Rajiv for messing up their lives in Srilanka by sending the IPKF. Considering this fact, the opposition lawyer Chandrasekar challenged the SIT that his party would accept all the claims against them if the SIT could prove that Vinothini and her family are innocent and they did not have anything to do in the murder. The SIT safely chose to skip this very important challenge from opposition and hence no one from that family was ever interrogated
h. The Srilankan government would have obviously been threatened by Rajiv’s statement that IPKF will make another visit to Srilanka if he came back to power. Why the possibility that they had an interest in his death, was never considered?
i. Premadasa was popularly blamed for the assassination of many of the political leaders of his time including Kamini Thissanayaka, Adhulath Mudhali and Vikrama Singhe. Why there was no investigation done considering this possibility?
j. Politicians with vested interest or even his party leaders who may find him as a hurdle in their political career could have used assassins to execute Rajiv out of political enmity. Why this angle was never considered?
k. Rajiv as a Prime Minister had close links with so many international weapon dealers. Why they couldn’t have had a hand in this assassination?
We don’t need reputed agencies like the CBI or SIT to conduct the investigation if the end result is only to file a report blaming a few individuals without considering any of the obvious possibilities.
Though we all agree that “not every question turns out to be a fact” But if these strong suspicious circumstances are not investigated there is every chance that the real conspirators protected by powerful groups get away easily. Those real culprits who go uncaught will turn out to be a true threat to the safety of the leaders of this nation.
Did the SIT ever perform an investigation or did they just prepare a report based on mere assumptions?
Verma Commission:
The Verma commission report strongly condemned the Security and Intelligence wings of both the Central and State governments of the time for the serious lapses in the security provided to Rajiv Gandhi.
Both Chandrasekar’s central government and the governor’s rule in Tamilnadu state are popularly considered to be Dummy governments run from under by Congress. The Verma commission blamed not just the Intelligence Bureau, Tamilnadu state government and its Police department but also the Congress party members for their sheer negligence of duty and lack of responsibility. The Verma commission made it very clear that the life of Rajiv could have been saved if they have done their duty properly.
The Ministerial Committee, established to review the Verma commission’s findings, winded up after they recommended disciplinary action against some senior officers who have failed to carry out their duty. The committee conducted face-to-face enquiry with four erring senior officers namely Head of Intelligence Bureau M.K. Narayanan, Home secretary G. Mani Sharma, Defense Secretary Vajpayee and Cabinet Secretary Vinod Pandey.
But the entire exercise is a big eye wash as anyone could understand. These officers were in service when the Verma commission submitted its recommendations, but the enquiry by the Congress Ministerial Committee was conducted after they retired from their service. It is a well managed drama in the guise of an enquiry where the involved Congress leaders are well aware of the fact that no disciplinary action can be taken against a public servant when they are not in service. As expected the involved officers approached legal bodies and got clear exceptions for omitting them for any sort of enquiry. Thus the Congress has clearly, with a meticulous plan, made sure none of Verma commission’s recommendations were implemented and also ensured that the involved officers are not subject to any disciplinary action.
The Verma commission raised very strong suspicions against the credibility of M.K.Narayanan as the Director of IB.
This claim is not without substance. In 1991 after the Parliament election was announced, a meeting was organized by Mr.Bargava –Home Secretary. MK Narayanan also participated in that meeting in which security of Rajiv Gandhi was discussed. Asst. Home Secretary NK Singh told the Verma Commission that MK Narayanan knows the details of Rajiv Gandhi‘s security. But MK Narayanan refused his presence in the meeting. When Verma commission asked both of them to give it in writing about their participation NK Singh gave it in writing confirming his participation, but MK Narayanan refused to give it in writing.
A copy of the original video taken exactly at time of the blast was with the IB director Mr.M.K.Narayanan apart from the one with SIT. Both Narayanan and SIT declined to submit the original video to the Verma commission. The SIT head Mr.Karthikeyan even claimed that no such video recording ever existed, as per the statements recorded in the Verma commission’s reports. Then the commission was reported by Karthikeyan that the video is being investigated by international experts to see if there are any deletions in the video. It is a shocking fact that the original version of the video was never submitted to the commission. Even in the last sitting of the commission’s enquiry process, Mr. Verma insisted on the missing original video. Mr.Karthikeyan maintained the same response that the video is still being investigated by foreign experts.
Verma in his report made it very clear that the video clippings of the final moments of assassination, shown later, where Rajiv was garlanded by Dhanu and when the bomb was detonated have been intentionally highly distorted and tampered with. Justice Verma raised an obvious question as to why the last few seconds of the video alone were blurred.
On 20th May, a day before the execution of Rajiv, the then Joint Director of IB wrote a letter to the Chiefs of all Police departments of all states requesting them to increase the security provided to Rajiv. Did he know that the assassins are closing in on Rajiv? If so why there was no alarm raised to stop this assassination?
Jain commission
1. Justice Jain as a preparatory step for his enquiry decided to set the periphery of the investigation. To enable this, he requested the file containing the original reports from the government that established the Verma commission. In a reply that shocked the entire nation especially Justice Jain, the Home Ministry reported that the file is MISSING.
a. Parliament was engulfed with chaos as members came down heavily on the government for its sheer negligence. A Special team was installed for SEARCHING the file.
b. Probably this is the first event in independent India where a Special Team was formed only to search for a file. The special team after filtering through all possible layers of all the responsible departments of the government includingthe PMO, law ministry and Home ministry ended up with empty hands. The Narasimha Rao government declared that they were not able to find the file
c. This curious case of a critical file missing from the government’s racks stalled the entire enquiry process by a whole year.
2. Later the Congress tried it best to interrupt the operation of Jain commission when it resumed its operation with the Public opinion hearings for the first time.
a. Immediately, in an unbelievable move, the Attorney General of the central government raised questions about the AUTHORITY of the Jain commission. Justice Jain demanded a written clarification from the Law Ministry.
b. The law ministry showing a complete lack of responsibility took a whole year to respond to Justice Jain.
c. In its response the Law Ministry introduced clear hurdles to the commission by ruling that the commission cannot get involved in any of the areas in which the investigation has already been done by the CBI’s SIT. Also it declared that the Jain commission does not have any authority to call for hearing anyone who has appeared before the SIT earlier.
d. Justice Jain refused to accept the rulings of the law ministry and explained that the commission has the right to enquire all aspects of the case when it enquires about the possibility of an ‘external conspiracy’. In a 60 page response to the Law ministry, Justice Jain ruled that the commission has every right to monitor the operations of the CBI and also to enquire any possible shortcomings in the CBI’s operations.
e. The Central government in turn demanded the Jain commission to change its stance to meet the expectations set earlier in the Law Ministry’s response limiting the Jain commission. It also requested to freeze the enquiry for an interim period. Jain strongly rejected any such halting of enquiry.
3. Since the government was not able to contain Jain through intimidation, various legal blockades were created against the commission’s operation.
a. The most important one was with a ‘PIL’ filed by a Delhi Lawyer Mustaq Ahamed challenging to nullify the G.O which installed the Jain commission.
b. He argued that the Jain commission cannot do a reinvestigation of the case or re-enquire the witnesses since the CBI has already done the enquiry and has even submitted its report. He added that if there is anyone else accused apart from those accused by the CBI, it will hinder the course of the case and will have negative reactions.
c. The Delhi high court which accepted the case for further investigation, issued an interim order prohibiting the Jain commission from enquiring anyone who has been a witness or has been issued charge sheet by the SIT.
d. Though the High court which investigated the PIL further, after the detailed hearings, did not find any merit in the case filed by Mustaq and rejected the suit and re-confirmed the authority of the Jain commission to call on any of the witness for a re-enquiry.
4. The Congress, in an obvious knee jerk reaction, came out tearing its own mask in its rush against the Jain commission.
a. The Central Congress government sent the rejected appeal of the lawyer Mustaq to the Supreme Court of India. It was then that the nation was shook by the sheer double standards of the Congress. Congress became the subject to wide suspicion by escalating the PIL filed by an individual, thus stopping the re-assessment of the witnesses of Rajiv’s murder case. Now with this step, Congress ended up getting itself identified in public as the true hand behind the PIL filed by Mustaq.
b. A suspicious Supreme Court questioned the Congress as to why it is promoting the suit filed by an individual. Congress which felt cornered by the questions from Supreme Court decided to withdraw the case filed through an individual and did so proving beyond doubt that it is the central Congress government which led the show from behind the screens and ensured that the credibility of witnesses are not reviewed by the Jain commission.
5. The most obvious and important fact that we learn is that the Congress saw the Jain commission as a clear threat to concealed identity of the politicians who had a definitive role in Rajiv’s murder. The die-hard efforts made by Congress to impede the effective operation of the Jain commission raised serious questions in the minds of the citizens of this country about the interest Congress has against a fair and free trial in the Rajiv assassination case.
6. In spite of all these barriers raised by Congress, the Jain commission did a detailed investigation of the assassination and identified Chadraswami and SubramanianSwamy as people who had definite role in the assassination
a. It pulled up all the intelligence records indicating the international crime links that Chandraswami had since 1987 and also the financial transactions made in international bank accounts involving arms dealers
b. The Jain commission cites the strong apprehension that Chandraswami had motive against Rajiv which has been recorded through multiple eye witnesses. Chandraswami has reportedly vowed to kill Rajiv [``Main usko khatam kar doonga (I'll finish him off),'' ``Jaise uski maain ki maut huie, vaise he Rajiv Gandhi ko marunga (Rajiv Gandhi will be killed the same way his mother was”].
c. However second and more concrete evidence was provided by the Central Board of Direct Taxes which seized original payment drafts made totaling 11 million USD in favor of arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi from Chandraswami ashram.
d. It also opens up the links that SubramanianSwamy had with the assassination.
e. Those documents until then were kept secret by the IB without being submitted to the central government. For the first time in February 1998, the then Secretary of the Jain commission Luthra sent these documents to the central government’s Home Secretary Singh from their secret IB shelves.
7. Though the Jain commission which was setup in 1991 got its life extended for about 12 times, this time in the face of the shocking revelations it has achieved, requested for an extension only by another year to conclude its investigation on the role by Chandraswamy, SubramanianSwamy and other foreign powers.
a. The hung parliament headed by I.K.Gujral was very fragile with Congress being a key contributor to the coalition. The Congress threatened to withdraw support and topple the government if the Jain commission was allowed to continue any further.
b. The government under the heavy pressure from the Congress led its Home Secretariat to inform the commission on 27th February 1998 that the government does not want the Commission to be working anymore and also ordered the commission to submit its concluding report in 7 days’ time.
c. Justice Jain was obviously taken aback by this shocking step from the government in closing down the only avenue open for a fair trial.
8. A senior minister from the Central government made a telephone call to Justice Jain and informed that there is no need to present a detailed report and it is sufficient to submit a high level report. Since the report will be on a very high level it does not have to be submitted in the Parliament and can be sent directly to the respective Ministry’s office. The highlight of the notification from the minister was that the Jain commission does not have to submit an ATR (Action Taken Report)
9. CBI officers also intimidated the commission which was busy preparing the final report of the enquiry. But the key findings of the Jain commission reports have already leaked to the media and all the information available so far are pitched completely against the Congress.
10. The commission went on with compiling the findings of the enquiry in spite of the interferences from the CBI. This lead to serious and prolonged altercations between the CBI officers and the Jain commission members. Justice Jain himself received threatening telephonic calls from many power centers. Jain made a clear mention of these bullying phone calls in his letter to the Home ministry. Witnessed by a flooding media crowd, Justice Jain in his final push against all these odds, presented his 2000 page report to the then Home Minister Indrajit Gupta in 1997.
A week later, Justice Jain who went back to his home town Jodhpur was up for a total surprise. Sonia Gandhi visited him at his home and thanked his for presenting the report.
11. In the aftermath of the storm created by the Jain commission’s findings, Outlook magazine reported on 24.11.1997 that the IB and RAW officers accepted that Narasimha Rao destroyed all the documentary evidences to save his close friend Chadraswamy who was considered as the key conspirator in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.
12. The files were not just made to disappear; they were even edited for their content to fit the view expected by ruling powers. It is against Indian Penal Code to tamper with/edit legal evidences/documents. All these mess happened in Narasimha Rao’s rule.
13. A highly intriguing question arises as to who executed such orders from Narasimha Rao. Luckily we are not here without an answer to this key question. The one who corrected government document and files to fit Narasimha Rao’s wishes was none other than our very own Home Minister who is quite infamous for his recommendations to reject the mercy petitions of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan. Jain commission’s enquiry brought to light, his involvement in tampering with the evidence against Indian Law.
14. A CBI officer Kumar while travelling back from his trip abroad for collecting evidences ‘lost’ his briefcase containing highly critical documents related to the case in London’s Heathrow airport. Who could have possible stolen the briefcase with documentary evidences? Did this happen without his knowledge or was it otherwise? After all this, there is no action taken against this officer. All that he did was to file a complaint with the Heathrow Police before returning to India, empty handed.
Source:
http://realkillersofrajiv.blogspot.in/
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