RTI activist Amit Jethwa's father seeks exemplary punishment for BJP MP

Ahmedabad: The father of slain RTI activist Amit Jethwa today demanded that exemplary punishment should be given to Junagadh BJP MP Dinu Solanki, who was arrested by CBI yesterday for allegedly having murdered his son. “We are satisfied that finally CBI has arrested him (Solanki). This has also restored our faith in the judiciary,” Bhikhabhai Jethwa told reporters here. [caption id=“attachment_1215131” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Dinu Solanki. IBNLive[/caption] “We do not want to seek death penalty for him (the MP) since we do not believe in it, but he should be jailed for 40 to 100 years. It should be an exemplary punishment,” he said. Bhikhabhai and his family had maintained that Solanki had been the one who had got their son killed. Following the murder, Bhikhabhai had waged a three-year long legal battle against the powerful BJP MP before the latter was arrested yesterday. Amit Jethwa, an RTI and environmental activist, had filed numerous RTI applications and a public interest litigation (PIL) on June 28, 2010, against illegal mining in the protected Gir forest region. The PIL had impleaded Solanki and his nephew Shiva Solanki as respondents. The RTI activist was shot dead 14 days later, on July 20, 2010. Gujarat Police had arrested six people, including Shiva Solanki and sharp shooter Sailesh Pandya, who had allegedly shot Amit outside Gujarat High Court. However, Gujarat police had ruled out involvement of the BJP MP in the murder. The BJP MP had also been given a clean chit by the Gujarat Police Crime Branch, forcing Bhikhabhai to approach Gujarat High Court. In his plea before high court, Bhikabhai had alleged that Gujarat police did not probe the case properly and that the state government was shielding the BJP MP. High court had ruled that the Gujarat police probe in the case had been “far from fair, independent, bona fide or prompt” and had transferred the inquiry to CBI. PTI