Wanted: courage

It was interesting to see Harish Salve’s outrage in ‘13 days later, CBI still hasn’t filed FIR’ (IE, November 30) that in the Judeo tapes the investigation focus is not on the corrupt, but on those who made the CD. May I remind Mr Salve that there is another case where no FIR has been lodged against those taking money on tape. Almost three years after the Tehelka expose, there is not a whiff of legal action against any (non-army) person seen taking money on tape. At the time that story broke, Mr Salve was the solicitor general of India, the second highest law officer of the country and was personally leading the legal team representing the Union of India in the Venkataswami Commission. This is the track-record of that team:

• It did not file a single affidavit on any investigation, by any agency, against those seen openly seen taking bribes on tape.
• It filed multiple cock-and-bull affidavits against Tehelka and its investors, First Global, trying to prove that there was a conspiracy behind the making of the tapes.
• It did not cross-examine a single person accused of corruption, including Bangaru Laxman and Jaya Jaitly.
• It spent days cross-examining the Tehelka journalists to ‘prove’ the conspiracy theory.
• When it was clear within two days of cross-examination by Ram Jethmalani, counsel for First Global, that the affidavits filed by the ministry of finance officials and income tax officers against Tehelka and First Global were a tissue of lies, Mr Salve personally reassured the commission that he would stick to his conspiracy theory regardless.

This would have been perfectly acceptable if Mr Salve had been representing one of those accused of taking bribes or the BJP, but he was representing the people of India, occupying a high law office, being paid for by taxpayers’ money. Yet there was no desire to bring the corrupt to book —quite the contrary. If Mr. Salve has had a genuine change of heart on what the reaction to a corruption expose should be, I hope he has the courage and grace to admit to all this. I also hope you will print this letter in full, in keeping with your tradition of journalism
of courage.
— Devina Mehra, Mumbai

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Decency, please

Apropos of the editorial, ‘Badals under a cloud’ (IE, December 3), I am a keen follower of the political scene in Ppunjab. What is the Congress and the chief minister, Captain Amarinder Singh, doing? The CM seems to have lost his basic decency. It was never the culture of the Congress to hurl abuse the way the CM now does. It is time the Congress woke up to this. We look to the higher ups in the party in Delhi to take drastic steps and restore to the party its old glow.
— Harinder, On e-mail

Remember Bhopal

It has been 19 years since the Bhopal Gas tragedy took place. It is indeed very regretful that the government has forgotten the victims of that terrible tragedy all together. The tragedy has highlighted the need for a regulatory framework and the basic norms that companies should follow. This shows once again the functioning of the government. They have shown that they really don’t care.
— Siddharth Viswanathan, On e-mail