Insisting that there was no wrongdoing in the arrest of Anna Hazare, Home Minister P Chidambaram on Wednesday said the government would deal with him "administratively and politically" but made it clear that his Jan Lokpal Bill was not acceptable.
Replying to a debate on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statement on Hazare episode, Chidambaram asserted that making laws was the sovereign right of Parliament although the views of civil society could be taken on board.
He said "respected" Hazare has the "undoubted right" to protest "as long as he wants" but subject to certain conditions and hoped he would do so.
Narrating the sequence of events that led to Hazare's arrest, Chidambaram argued that it was not the first time that Section 144 of CrPC was invoked and that the activist had been held for the intent to violate prohibitory orders.
"If there is apprehension of breach of peace, there can be arrest as a preventive measure... In this case it was quite clear that Hazare was going to violate Sec 144," he said, adding that decisions about Hazare's arrest were taken by the police and he was kept informed.
Chidambaram said Hazare had conveyed this to the police officers who met him at an apartment in Mayur Vihar locality. "I salute him. As a true Gandhian he said he will go to
Jai Prakash Narayan park and violate the prohibitory orders," he said.
"What wrong did we do? No force was used. No one was injured," he said while terming Hazare's arrest as "inevitably unfortunate". Chidambaram said it was an administrative decision but getting him released from court was a political decision.
