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at 11:56:03 pm on August 4, 2007
BHOPAL, Aug. 4: Hoping that actor Sanjay Dutt would be proved innocent before the Supreme Court in 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case, actor and former Union minister Shatrughan Sinha today said Dutt could have been “mischievous” but not a “terrorist”.
“I respect the court verdict of jail term to Dutt but hope he will be able to prove himself innocent before the Supreme Court and society,” Sinha, who was here to receive the National Kishore Kumar Samman by Madhya Pradesh government, told reporters here. Stating that he was sad over the jail term to Dutt, Sinha said he had helped the Bollywood star a lot in the case as “I was convinced that there was no question of him being a terrorist. May be he was mischievous”.
However, judiciary’s decision should be respected as India is not a “banana republic,” he said. At the same time people should not compartmentalise the issue and must pray for others sentenced like Sanjay Dutt and also those killed in the 1993 blasts, the BJP leader said.
Asked about his reported comments about BJP becoming a tool in the hands of a few leaders, the former minister said: “I am not speaking to you as a politician. I am here as an artist.” On whether the ruling BJP in the state showed partiality in conferring Kishore Kumar Samman to a party leader, he said “it could have been so had I been a raw artist … Without a track record of so many films. I leave it to your conscience.”
