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No record on Syama Prasad Mookerjee's death available?
PTI | New Delhi
Does any document exist pertaining to the death of Jan Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee in a Jammu and Kashmir prison 55 years ago?
The officials of the Home Ministry seem to have no clear answer about it as they could not come up with any "satisfactory" reply to the queries of an RTI applicant, who filed his plea in this regard.
Instead, the Ministry kept moving the application to different sections without providing any answer, applicant Jaydeep Mukherjee, who is also a functionary of the All India Legal Aid Forum, alleged.
One of his questions was whether the files pertaining to the death of the right-wing leader were confidential or not. But the ministry could not even ascertain that.
"The application was forwarded to the Ministry of Home Affairs on August 7 from Central Information Commission. Deputy secretary (Home Ministry) S K Bhatnagar forwarded it to Director, T N Chugh on August 17. The application was again forwarded to JK Division which sent it to another division of the Ministry. No satisfactory reply was ever given," he alleged.
Jaydeep said the ministry also forwarded the documents to Lok Sabha Secretariat as one of the questions related to the statement made by then prime minister Jawahar Lal Nehru, but no satisfactory reply was received. The secretariat in its reply, a copy of which was provided by Jaydeep, said "a mention has been traced about the death of Dr SP Mookerjee and two other members on August 3, 1953 in Lok Sabha debates. As per DOPT guidelines PIO is not required to do research on behalf of an applicant and deduce anything from the material and then supply it to him."
It asked him to visit National Library in Kolkata as a copy of parliamentary debates may be available with them.
"You may also visit the Parliament Library...And consult yourself the indices as well as Lok Sabha debates and cull out the required relevant portions," the letter provided by Jaydeep said.
Mookerjee went to Kashmir in 1953 where he started a hunger strike to protest the law prohibiting Indian citizens from settling in a state in their own country and the need to carry ID cards. He was arrested and jailed where he died on June 23, 1953.
It is alleged that his mother Jogmaya Devi had written to Nehru seeking a probe into his death in custody but the demise was declared to be from natural causes and hence no inquiry was conducted.
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