The stiff objections the Karnataka Government on Thursday raised to the bail application of Islamist leader Abdul Nasser Madani, 31st accused in the 2008 Bangalore bombings case, has disappointed the pro-Madani lobby in Kerala which has been hoping that the change of rule in the neighbouring State might help in securing his release from detention.
On Thursday, the fifth anniversary of the terror attack in Bangalore, the prosecution of the Congress Government in fact opposed Madani’s bail plea in the High Court even more vehemently than the former BJP Governments had done in the three years of his detention at the Parappana Agrahara prison, causing despair to the pro-Madani groups in Kerala.
As expected, the Muslim league, second largest constituent of Kerala’s Congress-led ruling UDF coalition, called for more efforts from the part of the State Government for influencing the thinking of its Karnataka counterpart with regard to the issue of considering Madani’s case on “humanitarian grounds”.
Madani’s lawyer P Usman told mediapersons in Bangalore that the prosecutor of the new Congress Government had put forward such harsh arguments that had not been mentioned even in the charge sheet of the prosecution filed during the former BJP rule. Sebastian Paul of the Justice for Madani Forum said the Karnataka Government was refusing to view the case legally.
In his despair over the position the prosecution adopted in the Karnataka High Court on Thursday, a top leader of Madani’s party, the PDP, said he was pained by the blandness in its argument that the Islamist leader was not suffering from any illness that was uncommon among people of around 50 years of age.
“Even the former BJP Government had understood that Madani had serious illnesses and that his eyesight was failing. But the argument now is that he has no vision impairment. That is nothing but cruel. We did not expect the prosecution to take such a stand under the rule of Congress, whose Kerala unit has always been claiming to be ready to help Madani,” he said.
Terming as strange the approach of the Karnataka Government to the Madani case, Muslim league’s national general secretary ET Muhammad Basheer said the new Government was following the same line as that of the previous BJP regime. He said there was need for better communication between the Kerala and Karnataka Governments on the matter.
“The Home Ministers of the two States should take a decision after detailed discussions,” Basheer said. The Karnataka Government’s approach showed that it was trying to settle some personal score with Madani instead of viewing the case in legal terms, Sebastian Paul alleged.
Opposing Madani’s bail plea in the High Court, the Karnataka prosecutor said that Madani was a habitual criminal and had 57 cases against him. He also said that Madani had connections with terror outfits in Pakistan and Bangladesh, adding that whatever treatment was required for him could be given in the prison. The court will now take up the plea on July 31.
The Bangalore Police had arrested Madani, crippled in one leg, from his operational headquarters at Anvarssery in Kerala’s Kollam district on August 17, 2010. Since then, he has been lodged at the Parappana Agrahara prison outside Bangalore. During this period he was out of prison three times: Twice for treatment and once for visiting Kollam for his daughter’s marriage.