Shinde never got letter warning him about disciplinary action: Jethmalani

Jethmalani, who is appearing for the Eknath Shinde faction in the disqualification petition being heard by Speaker Rahul Narwekar, has been focused on discrediting this second letter from the Shiv Sena chief whip sent to Shinde on June 23

Mumbai On Wednesday, Mahesh Jethmalani’s cross-examination of Sunil Prabhu, chief whip of the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, continued to focus on the veracity of the letter that Prabhu had sent to Eknath Shinde warning him of disciplinary action for defying the party whip and skipping a meeting of all Shiv Sena MLAs on June 22, 2022.

Shinde never got letter warning him about disciplinary action: Jethmalani

Jethmalani, who is appearing for the Eknath Shinde faction in the disqualification petition being heard by Speaker Rahul Narwekar, has been focused on discrediting this second letter from the Shiv Sena chief whip sent to Shinde on June 23. If he succeeds, it would prove that Shinde was not aware that he had defied the party whip by remaining absent on June 22nd meeting.

Prabhu was asked why the letter was written in English and whether he had understood the implications of the letter and asked him to produce a copy of the letter. (See box). Jethmalani also said that the Shinde faction MLAs had walked out of the Shiv Sena as they thought the alliance with the Congress and the NCP was “unethical, immoral and illegal”.

In his response, Prabhu first said that the letter, warning Shinde of disciplinary action, was sent to him via WhatsApp, but in the second half of the cross-examination Prabhu said that having checked with his office, he realised the letter to Shinde had been sent on email by the office secretary Vijay Joshi from the office email id. On Jethmalani’s insistence, he also produced a copy of this email sent to Shinde.

The lawyer also rebutted the Shiv Sena affidavit in court that the rebels had split the party to form a government with the BJP for personal gains. The Shinde faction, he said were in fact acting in the interest of the Shiv Sena as they considered the origibal pre-poll alliance with the BJP to be legal, moral and practically beneficial for the party. These MLAs, Jethmalani said, thought the post-poll alliance with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party to be illegal, immoral and a betrayal of the electorate. Prabhu disagreed with this assessment.

When Jethmalani questioned him about when he first became an MLA, Prabhu, responding in a lighter vein reminded Jethmalani that he had campaigned for him when he had contested Lok Sabha election from Mumbai North-Central in 2009 but failed to win. “Jethmalani Saheb, as a party worker, I had raised slogans of Jethmalani Saheb Zinadbad during the campaign. Anil Parab was the chief of the campaign for the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance,” he reminded the lawyer.

Speaker Rahul Narwekar, not wanting to be left behind in this bonhomie, quipped, “Is that why he (Prabhu) is being asked such simple questions?”

Jethmalani, without missing a beat then said that since Prabhu was his campaigner in the election, he was exempted from answering the question. “Those were the good days of the alliance. Even Uddhav Thackeray had held a couple of campaign meetings for me,” he said.

Prabhu’s cross examination is expected to continue for another 2 days.