Jammu: Union minister Ajay Maken on Friday sought pardon for the convict in the murder of his uncle Congress MP Lalit Makhan, saying that he had behaved "extraordinary well" in jail.
"As a nephew of Lalit Maken and also his daughter Avantika, both of us felt that he (Ranjit Singh Gill) should be pardoned," Maken told reporters here.
"We felt it in 2004 and we are still holding the same view that he should have been pardoned because there was not enough proof. Secondly, he behaved extraordinary well in the jail," he said.
The Delhi High Court had awarded life sentence to convict Gill alias Kukki for the 1985 murder of the then Congress MP Lalit Maken.
The Union Minister of Sports refused to comment on the other accused in the case.
After the murder, Gill had fled to the US. Two years later, through Interpol, he was arrested and lodged in a US jail. In May 2000, the US court allowed his extradition to
India.
Lalit, son-in-law of late former president Shankar Dayal Sharma, his wife Geetanjali, and a security was murdered in July 31, 1985.
A sessions court sentenced Gill to life imprisonment in February 2003 after convicting him for the murder of Maken, his wife Geetanjali and a security man at their Kirti Nagar residence.
Maken, his wife Geetanjali and security man were shot dead by five motorbike-borne unidentified Sikh youths at the MP's residence in Kirti Nagar area in New Delhi. The MP's three- year-old daughter was the lone survivor in the tragedy.
PTI
First Published: Friday, June 17, 2011, 23:45