Shimla, December 9
The grant of clemency to Ian Stillman, a British national who was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment for drug trafficking last year, will have a demoralising effect on the police which has been engaged in a relentless crusade against the drug mafia involving foreigners in Kulu district.
Stillman was released on Saturday night after the President of India accepted his mercy appeal. It is learnt that the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, had taken up the matter with the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr L.K. Advani, during his recent visit to India. Subsequently, the British High Commission had filed a petition for clemency.
Ostensibly, Stillman has been granted clemency on health grounds, but the real cause behind the decision to let the convict free is the pressure built up by the British media and some Christian groups in the print and electronic media as well as the Internet with some projecting him as an ‘innocent charity worker’.
It was a rare case when a foreigner involved in drug trafficking was convicted by the Sessions Court, the High Court and the Supreme Court and yet granted clemency by the President. The decision has left investigating and prosecuting agencies demoralised. They feel that such decision will only embolden the international drug mafia, which has already found roots in the Kulu valley.
Already, about 140 drug
peddlers, including 37 foreign nationals, have been arrested under the Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances Act over the past one year.
Stillman was caught in the valley in January 2001 with 20 kg of cannabis worth about Rs 2 crore and convicted by the trial court on June 2, 2001. The British mediapersons kept insisting that Stillman was not able to defend himself because of language problem.
The fact was that he had been living in Kanya Kumari for the past 29 years and as such was conversant with the local Indian language. Moreover, he had answered all written queries put to him in English under Section 313 of the CrPC, indicating that language was not a hindrance in a free and fair trial.
Stillman all along claimed to be deaf, but the basis of his defence was blasted when the police produced video-tapes in which he was shown giving interviews to the electronic media before the court. Not only that, he even refused to undergo test to ascertain whether he was actually deaf.
The British media showed the Indian judicial system in bad light. The remarks made by Stillman on his official website www.IanStillman.ssnet.co.uk about it would have ordinarily attracted contempt proceedings.
