Jayant Sinha said, "When I talk about justice, I mean that not just the victim but also those who were wrongly incarcerated for a year should get the justice."
Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha on Thursday said that he and some other members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had financially assisted persons -- accused of lynching a cattle trader in Jharkhand -- pay their legal fee and get bail.
In an interview to BBC Hindi, Sinha, who was asked why he had garlanded the accused when they came to his home after the Jharkhand High Court granted them bail, he said: "If you read the case, think and read the high court bail order, you will find the people who visited me were innocent."
Fifty-five-year-old Alimuddin Ansari, who was transporting meat in his van, was allegedly intercepted by a cow vigilante group in Ramgarh and lynched in broad daylight on June 29, 2017. The video of the incident had gone viral on social media.
Sinha said, "When I talk about justice, I mean that not just the victim but also those who were wrongly incarcerated for a year should get the justice."
When asked how he had assisted the accused, Sinha responded: "The family of the accused had asked me to get a lawyer and if we could also pay the fee."
The union minister added that "since so many people, including the members of the party, had aided them because a member of the party was also involved in the case, we in the party decided to do what was asked of us."
In March 2017, a fast track court had sentenced 11 of the 12 accused in the case to life imprisonment, but the Jharkhand High Court suspended their sentence and granted them bail in July 2018.
The BJP MP from Hazaribagh had kicked up a storm after pictures featuring him and garlanded accused came to light.