Sunanda Pushkar case: Shiv Menon's counsel says that it's not public interest litigation but 'publicity interest litigation'

Image: Sunanda Pushkar

New Delhi: In Sunanda Pushkar death case, Shiv Menon's counsel, on Tuesday, said before the court that it's not a public interest litigation but a "publicity interest litigation". In reply to which, Subramanian Swamy submitted before that court that "I don't need any publicity,I am a politician and an MP so I don't need publicity". Sunanda Pushkar's son Shiv Menon also moved an application seeking a direction to conclude the investigations in a time bound manner. Senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy, on Monday, filed a fresh application in the Delhi High Court seeking within 45 days a copy of the charge sheet to be filed by the city police in connection with the death of Congress MP Shashi Tharoor's wife Sunanada Pushkar. The BJP leader moved the fresh plea in his pending petition seeking a court-monitored CBI-led special investigation (SIT) probe into Pushkar's death. Advocate Ishkaran Singh Bhandari, also a petitioner along with Swamy, said that the application "exposed more facts" with regard to the case and the investigation into it. Earlier, a bench of justices G S Sistani and Chander Shekhar, during the hearing of Tharoor's stepson Shiv Menon's plea for his impleadment in the BJP leader's petition, had expressed concern over failure of the police to file a charge sheet in the case even after three-and-a-half years. It had also sought Swamy's response on Menon's plea to implead him as a party in the proceedings before the high court. Menon has also questioned Swamy's locus in seeking such a probe, alleging that he was doing it only for publicity. The bench, however, had asked Delhi Police to make its stand clear by August one and refused to pass any restraining order against Swamy. Menon's plea has also said that the investigating agency should be directed not to supply Swamy the copy of the status report with regard to the ongoing probe in the case. Pushkar was found dead under mysterious circumstances in a suite of a five-star hotel in south Delhi on the night of January 17, 2014. Swamy, along with advocate Bhandari in their plea, has alleged that "inordinate delay" has been caused in the investigation "which is a blot on the justice system". They have also claimed that many of the evidences in the case have been destroyed and alleged that Tharoor was influencing investigation in the matter. The plea, which was filed on July six, has sought setting up of a multi-disciplinary SIT of the Intelligence Bureau, the Enforcement Directorate, the Research and Analysis Wing and the Delhi Police, which should be headed by the CBI, to probe the case.