Jain writes: "Training (for LTTE in India) was for self defence"

On July 19, 1991, in a secret annexure to a letter to Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao, then Supreme Court Chief Justice Ranganath Mishra expressed similar misgivings about the suggested terms of reference. He pointed out that the Thakkar Commission had also looked into the question of a larger conspiracy into the assassination of Indira Gandhi and this had “led to a lot of embarrassment.”

Despite such sound judicial advice and the fact that the SIT was already investigating the assassination, Rao — under pressure from Gandhi loyalists in his party — agreed to the setting up of yet another commission. The new commission was to probe “the sequence of events leading to and the facts and circumstances of Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination”, extremely broad terms of reference which overlapped with both the Verma Commission and the criminal trial in Tamil Nadu.

Soon after Justice M C Jain was appointed to head the new commission, he called for the file dealing with the setting up the Verma Commission. Despite exhaustive searches in the Home Ministry and the Prime Minister’s office and residence it could not be traced.

The government finally supplied an insistent Justice Jain with a reconstructed file after officials swore in affidavits that the file was missing. Justice Jain smelt a rat. Rao, when queried about the missing file by the commission, took the plea that a missing file is not uncommon in a government office.

A curious point about the Jain Commission’s interim report is that the evidence presented and the judge’s conclusions do not always seem to square.

To most people, it would appear from the material presented that former Prime Minister V P Singh had a valid reason for denying SPG cover to Rajiv Gandhi since he was no longer Prime Minister. On the face of it, Singh, as Prime Minister, had taken adequate steps to ensure that Gandhi was well protected.

V P Singh pointed out to the Commission that under the existing SPG Act, passed by Rajiv Gandhi’s government, the elite service was exclusively meant for the incumbent Prime Minister and his family.

The V P Singh government spent Rs 75 lakhs annually on Rajiv Gandhi’s security. One hundred and twenty five security personnel, including 21 NSG commandos were posted at his residence. Additionally, there were 25 persons for his public and private engagements. Four bullet-proof cars were provided by the Government for the Gandhi family and five other cars for pilot and escort duty. There was a complement of 18 drivers at his disposal and communication facilities were set up in the carcade and at his residence.

No harm came to Gandhi during Singh’s tenure.

Justice Jain, however, seems to endorse the charge of some Congress MPs that withdrawing SPG cover for Gandhi was a politically motivated act. In fact, the judge insinuates that there is a possibility that Singh’s actions may have been motivated by “malice, bias or animus.” When Singh quoted intelligence and security reports to justify his government’s actions, Justice Jain’s response was: “It is unbelievable that Shri V P Singh could be swayed by the opinion of the security and bureaucratic experts.” Logically, one would have assumed that the PM was expected to take the advice of experts!

Justice Jain feels that as Prime Minister, Chandra Shekhar “gave no thought to the security of Rajiv Gandhi.” This despite the fact that in February 1991, Shekhar wrote a letter to Gandhi expressing concern that he was not following the instructions of the security advisers. Shekhar suggested that some more structures for security be constructed at 10 Janpath. Gandhi’s response was: “I would be very reluctant to accept any more protective measures unless they are really required.”

Both former prime ministers explained to the commission that their respective home ministers — Mufti Mohammed Sayed and Subodh Kant Sahay — had written more than once to Rajiv Gandhi expressing concern that he was ignoring the advice of his security officers, using private vehicles instead of bullet-proof cars and disregarding other security norms.

Justice Jain, however, questions whether these letters were “prompted by genuine or bona fide intentions.”

Though it is obvious from the evidence before the commission that both the Karunanidhi government in Tamil Nadu and the Rajiv Gandhi government in Delhi were at some stage deeply involved with the LTTE, Justice Jain adopts different standards in judging the conduct of the two leaders.

Jain comes down on the DMK and M Karunanidhi with a ton of bricks for hobnobbing with the militants holding them indirectly responsible for the assassination.

However, the Rajiv Gandhi and Indira Gandhi administration’s training and arming of LTTE and other Sri Lankan militants was acceptable to Justice Jain. “To insinuate that the training of militants organised in India contributed to the growth of Sri Lankan Tamil militancy would be simplistic. Evidence before the Commission indicates that the training was essentially for self-defence and not for launching military operations or for encouraging internecine conflict.” he ruled. (The Indian Peace Keeping Force at the receiving end of the highly trained LTTE cadres probably did not see the matter in this benign light!) Justice Jain stresses the point that “prior to 1989 the militancy, particularly LTTE activity, was not anti-national in character”, unmindful of the bomb explosion at Madras airport in 1985 caused by Tamil militants in which 30 people were killed, numerous clashes between rival groups of Tamil militants on Indian soil and smuggling across the border by the LTTE.

In viewing Indo-Sri Lankan relations, Jain emerges as a flag-waving patriot. “There may be political compulsions for Shri Premadasa for giving a unilateral ultimatum (for the IPKF withdrawal) but the unholy alliance with the LTTE was a stab in the back of the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord,” he notes. Some Sri Lankans might well feel that it was the Indian government who had no business to be in an “unholy alliance” with the LTTE and Premadasa’s fear that the Indian Army might stay on in his country was justified.

The irony is that in the voluminous interim report most of the contents are devoted to events which are not really germane to the inquiry proper. The few references to a possible larger conspiracy surface only very briefly and tantalisingly, the questions are left unanswered.

The video film which recorded Rajiv Gandhi’s arrival at Sriperumbudur has been tampered with and the latter part of the video has mysteriously got Doordarshan news programmes taped over it.

A taped conversation between LTTE conspirators Sivarasan and Pottu Amman, two months before the assassination, asking whether the deed should be done in Delhi or Madras was never passed on to the right quarters.

Who was responsible for inducting Lata Kannan, a former DMK worker who joined the Congress just three months before the assassination? Kannan was blown up in the bomb blast at Sriperumbudur and appears to have been very friendly with the conspirators.

Differences bet ween the TNCC(I) and Congress leader Maragatham Chandrasekhar led the TNCC(I) to dissassociate itself with the Sriperumbudur function. Chandrasekhar chose the site of a temple which was unsuitable as compared to an available school-ground. Chief organiser A J Dass did not have the competence to control his own Congress cadres.

For the answers to these questions, one has apparently to wait for part two of the Jain report. Justice Jain concedes that his task is just beginning.

“How the LTTE aided and abetted in the commission of the crime. Were there other forces behind the LTTE? These are questions requiring a deep and anxious probe,” he explains in his interim report.