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‘I did not quit’
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I write to set the record straight,
particularly, as there are factual
and opinion-errors of the defama-
tory kind hurled simply to seek a
media sunburn. The record needs
to be factual if the public’s right to
know is to mean anything.
First, let me say that I did not
‘quit’ (as mentioned in the piece
headlined ‘Out of court settlement
likely in lawsuit against Indian
consul general,’ India Abroad, July
8).
Indeed, I was personally
requested by Ambassador Prabhu
Dayal, India’s consul general in
New York, the evening of June 20
to represent him in an emergency
situation and, after intensive due
diligence, he and I had to address
the week-long media storm.
Happily, the emergency is now
over, as of June 27, and things are
stable. The Indian government
will retain counsel for him. He is a
dear family friend, and I have
been honored to accept his invita-
tion and protect him in his time of
need. My obligation of attorney-client
confidentiality, for matters that were
covered, remains inviolate. Having said
that, if Ambassador Dayal’s statement
about the passport is read precisely the
argumentative conclusions asserted by
a non-party, Anand Ahuja, with zero
knowledge of the actual facts, can only
be seen as meddlesome arrogance
soaked in ignorance and asserted with
legal blindness. This does not aid the
public’s right to know, but simply is a
misdirection by one who at best seeks
an interloper status in the matter.
Second, ignoring other quoted errors
of opinion in that story, there is a par-
ticularly offensive quote that is both
factually and legally wrong to a point of
belly-laughter and is near-defamatory.
‘If it is true, then this is a serious mat-
ter and may be considered as obstruc-
tion of justice....’ This kind of pro-
nouncement is useless and a false con-
clusion of law, denigrating the lawful
sending of a letter seeking that the law
be ‘enforced,’ and that too in a nation of
laws that is America. Hence, it is proof
of certain folks’ need to be shrill and
abusive merely to secure media atten-
tion, and having gotten it, expose them-
selves not to applause but its polar
opposite. Such reckless pronounce-
ment, aside from boomerang ridicule,
can bring disrespect to the law itself,
and that no officer of the court is
authorized to do, not even one who
seeks a media-sunburn.
Finally, to recalibrate the public com-
prehension towards accuracy of impor-
tant legal issues, let me say I have no
representative involvement in any
reported settlement efforts post my
time of service, and hence can add no
additional value on that topic with that
status. Leaving aside the facts of this
case, I see no bar to a nation who has
sent one of it’s citizen on an official
passport to another nation for a specif-
ic task, upon learning of such person’s
SNAPSINDIA
Indian-American community leaders gather at City Hall in New York to show their
support for Prabhu Dayal, India’s consul general in New York
violation of the duties imposed by such
passport-status and going AWOL can-
celing the government-based passport
and issuing an arrest warrant, pursuant
to its laws, if such is permitted, and
seeking extradition of such person who
has embraced illegality to face the
charges of such illegal conduct in its
courts.
One ought to remember that when
every day American draftees during the
Vietnam War illegally went to Canada
or elsewhere to escape the draft, the
United States was free to seek and did
seek their return and prosecute them
pursuant to the full extent of our law.
India, which is also a nation of laws, is
well within her right to seek to enforce
her laws on Indian citizens charged
with criminal violation of Indian laws;
indeed, India is free to charge non-
Indian citizens for violation of Indian
law. Extradition is merely a bilateral
treaty that permits such physical trans-
fer of an individual between consenting
nations. One can remember in 1998
that Augusto Pinochet of Chile, while in
England, fought being extradited to
Spain based upon the arrest warrant
issued by Spanish judge Baltazar
Garzon. But for Jack Straw’s finding of
humanitarian grounds he would have
been in Spain.
In fact, in August 2009, an Indian
judge issued an arrest warrant for
Union Carbide’s former chief executive
officer, Warren Anderson, causing India
to seek his extradition. The law is a
many-splendored thing, and at its core
resides spiritual beauty, grounded in
the near-cosmic balance of equity and
law, the yin and yang. For those who
have sufficient humility to abort igno-
rance-based arrogance, refrain from
useless media-attention for meaning-
less self glorification, and with suffi-
cient study and an endless journey
within, may find the holy grail of
knowledge and power, the authorized
It is appalling that a few Indian-
American community leaders deemed
it necessary to gather at Manhattan City
Hall in support of Consul General
Prabhu Dayal, while no one went over
in to support the domestic assistant
Santosh Bhardwaj. Is she not an Indian
worthy of their support? Isn’t it crimi-
nal to demand her deportation even
before she has been judged?
Isaac A Samuel
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
The Constitution
rules
As we honored our nation’s independ-
ence last weekend, Congressman Keith
Ellison – only one of two Muslims on
Capitol Hill – was being viciously ques-
tioned about his absolute allegiance to
the law of the land. This, despite his
emphatic statements that the
Constitution is the bedrock of our
country.
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