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My speech taken out of context: MP

Special Correspondent

Regrets the trouble his remarks have caused to the Congress

K. Sudhakaran, MP, addressing a press conference in Kannur on Thursday.

KANNUR: K. Sudhakaran, MP, has said that his speech at a public function at Kottarakara has been taken out of context for political motives to present it as an attempt to cast aspersions on the judiciary.

Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, Mr. Sudhakaran, who reportedly alleged at a public function of the United Democratic Front (UDF) at Kottarakara recently that he was witness to a Supreme Court judge receiving money as a consideration for nullifying a High Court verdict cancelling a bar licence, said his remarks at the function had been used for a media trial by picking them out of context. He, however, regretted the trouble that his ‘insignificant' remarks in the speech had created for the Congress. His speech at the function had been preceded by speeches of various leaders, many of whom had highlighted unhealthy practices prevailing in the judiciary, he said. That being the context, he had also spoken of an incident that came to his memory, the MP said emphasising that it was not at all an allegation against the judiciary as an institution.

Distinguishing the judiciary from judicial officers, Mr. Sudhakaran said that a huge majority of the judges in the country were impeccable models, while there were a few judges who deviated from the values being upheld by the judiciary. ‘‘I was voicing my views on the unhealthy tendencies among a few judges and I had not named any judge in my speech,'' he said.

Ready to disclose details

To repeated questions about the specific allegation that he had raised at the Kottarakara speech, Mr. Sudhakaran said he would disclose the details before proper authorities, if necessary, and not before the media.

The MP said there were several instances sufficient to create suspicion about judges. The Supreme Court's admission of a petition filed by Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader O. Bharathan questioning his election from the Edakkad Assembly constituency without hearing him was unprecedented, he said adding that nobody could blame him if he suspected the judge who had admitted the petition.

The Supreme Court's acquittal of the convicts in the K.T. Jayakrishnan murder case had also raised doubts about the fairness of the judgment, he said.

As a political worker who had been talking about the importance of the judiciary in party classes and debates, he could not deliberately act in any way that would weaken the judiciary as an institution, the MP said. As a Congress worker, he had always upheld the importance of the judiciary against attempts of Communists to dub Indian courts as bourgeois courts, he said.

The Congress leader said his public life in the conflict-ridden politics of Kannur district would have been impossible but for the protection provided by the judiciary. He was pained by the allegation that his speech was an attempt to weaken the judiciary.

Personal views

Terming his remarks in the speech as his personal views, he said that though no one in the party had sought explanation from him on his controversial remarks, he would send fax messages to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala.

Referring to the allegation reportedly levelled by one Illikkal Jose, allegedly a former bar hotel partner, that Mr. Sudhakaran had served as a middleman for bar hotel owners to get the cancellation of bar hotel licences revoked, the MP said that he personally did not know the person who, he said, was a brother of a CPI(M) worker and had undergone imprisonment in some criminal case. Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) were trying to cook up a criminal case against him, Mr. Sudhakaran said.

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