The Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha is now querying whether its legal cases which were before the court had been compromised because of illegal wiretapping by the Security Intelligence Agency (SIA).
Its secretary general Sat Maharaj and assistant secretary Devant Maharaj were among several people who had been "spied on" by the SIA as identified by Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar during her statement in the Parliament last Friday. Following that announcement the Maharajs said they planned to sue the state and former prime minister Patrick Manning. A letter was sent to the Direct of Public Prosecutions Roger Gaspard on Monday, via their attorneys Jagdeo Singh, Kelvin Ramkissoon and Larry Lalla.
Speaking at a press conference at the Maha Sabha headquarters, Eastern Main Road, St Augustine, yesterday, Maharaj (S) said he and Maharaj (D) were victims of an illegal exercise. They were accompanied by the spiritual leader of the Hindu community Dharmacharya Uttam Maharaj and their attorneys. Maharaj (S) said: "We have asked our legal team to do a number of things on our behalf. "One was to firstly write to the Director of Pubic Prosecutions indicating that we have great concerns about the revelations by the Prime Minister that we are being spied upon and that the spying exercise wasn't a legal exercise but quite illegal. "And we ask our legal team to pursue with the DPP and to investigate whether we have a legal case, both against the State and against the former head of the National Security Council who was Mr Patrick Manning."
Maharaj (S) also referred to constitutional cases which were won by the Maha Sabha in the Privy Council, namely the Maha Sabha Radio Licence and the Trinity Cross case. "Not only were the senior officers in the Maha Sabha spied on but now our attorney, who was Anand Ramlogan, who is the present Attorney General, he was also being spied upon so we ask ourselves the question whether our cases were being compromised," he added.
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Offences for a prima facie case as outlined by the attorneys:
-Misconduct/misbehaviour in public office;
-money laundering, fraudulent conversion and cheating the public revenue;
-conspiracy to defraud;
-Nigel Clement/misconduct in public office; and,
-Offences against The Computer Misuse Act chap 11:17.