Soumitra Sen may still face impeachment proceedings in Lok Sabha

NEW DELHI: Notwithstanding Kolkata High Court judge Soumitra Sen's decision to put in his papers ahead of the commencement of impeachment proceedings against him in the Lok Sabha, law officers of the government are learnt to have advised that the process to unseat him should be taken to its logical conclusion.

The legal view available before the government has put a spanner in former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee's attempts to save Sen, even at the eleventh hour. The former Lok Sabha Speaker is said to have gotten in touch with Congress managers to find out whether the party could change its stance in the Lok Sabha and bail Sen out.

Chatterjee's efforts were, however, stonewalled by the Congress strategists, who told him that their stand in the Lok Sabha on the impeachment motion would be in consistence with the one adopted in the Upper House. The former Lok Sabha Speaker, in fact, was asked to use his clout to persuade Sen, who has since then become traceless, to send his resignation letter through the proper channels to the Rashtrapati Bhawan, i.e., through the Union Ministry of Law and Justice.

The government law officers are learnt to have argued that the impeachment proceedings against Sen should press ahead, even though he had resigned.

Also, the signature in the resignation letter faxed by the disgraced Kolkata High Court judge to the Rashtrapati Bhawan on Thursday was not found to be "original".

"The signature in the faxed letter has been found not original. We are waiting for the hard copy of the letter to arrive and check the signature," Archana Datta, spokesperson of President Pratibha Patil, said.

"Let the letter come. Any decision by the President will be only after that," she added.

The President's office has, in the meanwhile, handed over the faxed letter to the Department of Law and Justice, the spokesperson said.