Salman Khan’s Yakub tweet kicks up storm

With the Supreme Court today poised to take up the hearing of the mercy petition filed by 1993 Mumbai serial blast convict Yakub Memon, who is scheduled to be hanged on July 30, the political temperature in the country has soared with the BJP stating that the hanging should not be communalised, adding that terrorism had no religion.

On the other hand BJP Member of Parliament Shatrughan Sinha signed on a petition along with party’s expelled MP Ram Jethmalani to President Pranab Mukherjee, requesting him to waive off the death sentence. In addition to this, a controversy was created around the late night tweets by actor Salman Khan claiming that Yakub was innocent.

However, following the protests, Salman Khan on Sunday apologized unconditionally for his actions and retracted the controversial tweets. The actor had shown sympathy towards Yakub Memon and said that instead of Yakub, his brother Tiger Memon should be hanged. Raising strong objections to Salman’s tweets, Public Prosecutor Ujwal Nikam had threatened to file a case of contempt of court if the actor did not retract his tweet.

Mumbai BJP members protested outside Salman’s house at Bandra on Sunday evening, demanding his unconditional apology. Police had to take strong action to control the protestors with a woman protestor reportedly injured in the ensuing lathi charge.

Meanwhile, the15-page petition which included the signatures of Sinha and Jethmalani has cited various legal points and international commitments to argue that Memon should not be hanged. “Grant of mercy in this case will send out a message that while this country will not tolerate acts of terrorism but as a nation we are committed to equal application of the power of mercy and values of forgiveness, and justice. Bloodletting and human sacrifice will not make this country a safer place; it will, however, degrade us all,” the signatories said.

Besides Sinha and Jethmalani, those, who have signed the petition include MPs like Mani Shankar Aiyar (Congress), Majeed Memon (NCP), Sitaram Yechury (CPI-M), D Raja (CPI), K T S Tulsi and H K Dua (nominated) and T Siva (DMK), former CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat, CPI(ML)-Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya, Brinda Karat (CPI-M) and filmmakers and actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Mahesh Bhatt, M K Raina and Tushar Gandhi.

They also argued that the death sentence has been awarded under TADA which was repealed. “Memon has been tried and sentenced to death under TADA, a special law which was repealed by Parliament on account of it having been used to target minorities,” they said and referred to a Supreme Court judgement that questioned the legality of prosecutions pursued after the repeal of TADA.