Front Page   

VHP lawyer appointed Jharkhand Governor

By Our Special Correspondent

New Delhi July 6. A Vishwa Hindu Parishad legal adviser, Justice M. Rama Jois (retd.), has been appointed as the Governor of Jharkhand. The Ranchi Raj Bhavan had been vacant since the last Governor, Prabhat Kumar, resigned on January 31.

Mr. Jois is a retired Chief Justice of the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Since his retirement he has been associated with the Ayodhya "movement'' and is known to be in charge of the marshalling of legal resources on behalf of the Ramjanbhoomi Nyas. He has also put in an appearance as the VHP counsel in the Supreme Court during the hearing on the petition for a "symbolic puja'' in March last.

Though his formal position in the Sangh Parivar is as the president of the Bharat Vikas Parishad, an RSS frontal organisation, Mr. Jois is known more for his legal assistance in the "Ayodhya movement.'' He has even attended a meeting at the Prime Minister's house last March when Atal Behari Vajpayee held extensive consultations in an attempt to deal with the VHP-imposed deadline of "March 12''. To the extent Mr. Jois appointment as the governor-designate is the first important decision taken after L. K. Advani's elevation as Deputy Prime Minister, it can be seen as an indication of the things to come. The Ranchi Raj Bhavan has been awaiting a governor for more than five months, and Mr. Jois is the first beneficiary of the new arrangement.

It is also being speculated that the Jois appointment may be part of a larger effort to mollify the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, which is again threatening to go aggressive on its temple agenda. And though the VHP has been demanding its share of patronage from various BJP State Governments, particularly in Gujarat, this is the first known case of a VHP personality being accommodated by the decision-makers. However, the RSS has already claimed its share of spoils and some of the senior "swaymsevaks'' are now in place in the Raj Bhavans in Bhopal (Bhai Mahavir), Gandhinagar ( Sunder Singh Bhandari) and Lucknow ( Vishnu Kant Shastri).

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Front Page

News: Front Page | National | Southern States | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary |

Stories in this Section

• Advani to take up with PM railway bifurcation issue
• Five more Railways zones announced
• Court cannot decide on Ram temple: VHP
• I have no faith in Musharraf: Advani
• Musharraf order targets Benazir, Sharif
• VHP lawyer appointed Jharkhand Governor
• No water, Krishna to tell PM
• Ambani dead
• Afghan leader shot dead
• Fare wars over Indian skies

Copyright © 2002, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu