New Delhi, Oct 31 (IANS) Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief and Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Wednesday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to see that Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is booked for murder and criminal conspiracy for his alleged role in the communal violence of 2002.
The RJD president Lalu Prasad led a delegation of his party’s ministers and members of parliament to the prime minister’s residence to seek the government follow-up on the expose by the Tehelka newsmagazine of Modi’s role in the 2002 violence.
He demanded that the Gujarat chief minister be booked under Section 302 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) for murder and Section 120B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for criminal conspiracy.
Lalu Prasad told mediapersons the prime minister promised serious consideration of his demand.
“We will also take up this matter in tomorrow’s cabinet meeting,” he said.
“If in place of Modi, I or any of my party members were involved in such a crime, would anyone have waited so long to put us behind bars?” asked an agitated Lalu Prasad.
While RJD parliamentarians Mohammad Shahabuddin and Pappu Yadav are currently in jail following their conviction in criminal cases, Lalu Prasad himself had been sent to jail a number of times, pending trial in a case relating to corruption in fodder purchase.
Talking to media outside the prime minister’s residence, Lalu Prasad recalled how he and his party had all along been alleging that leaders of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its affiliate organisations were involved in the violence that claimed more than 1,000 lives in Gujarat.
“Whenever we raised our fingers at Modi and the Sangh/BJP, they said we were lying. Today Babu Bajrangi and the government lawyer have come on record to confirm whatever we had said.”
He was referring to what Bajrangi, a main accused in a massacre in Ahmedabad in February 2002, and public prosecutor Arvind Pandya were shown on TV channels as telling the undercover reporter in the sting operation.
“When I said in parliament that Modi is responsible, there were howls of protest from the BJP. When I instituted an inquiry into the Sabarmati Express train burning at Godhra, they cried foul. Today, more than whatever I had said is being said by Bajrangi,” the RJD chief stressed.
“Actions like those in Gujarat create terrorism in the country,” he added.
Lalu Prasad also announced plans to start an agitation in his home state Bihar to demand the arrest and trial of Modi.