Khurana court arrest, target Jaswant on Kandahar issue

New Delhi, July 24 (UNI) Former Delhi chief minister Madan Lal Khurana today courted arrest at Jantar Mantar here demanding arrest of former External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh for concealing information about a mole in the Prime Minister Office (PMO) disclosing India's nuclear programme secrets to United States.

Mr Khurana who was arrested when he tried to march towards Parliament along with some of his supporters, was of the view that concealing such vital information about the country's security was an ''anti-national'' act on the part of Mr Singh, who had been a Union minister for almost six years.

The former Delhi chief Minister also sat on a dharna seeking a CBI inquiry into the Kandahar episode.

Mr Singh in his book "Call to Honour: In the service of emergent India" had revealed that he had withheld this information as the prestige of the PMO was involved. According to Mr Singh, a PMO official had been passing out information to the US about the country's nuclear programme during Mr Narasimha Rao's regime.

Mr Khurana, who was later let off by the police, said the matter had become more serious after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had also challenged the former External Affairs Minister to identify the person.

Stressing the need for a CBI inquiry into Kandahar issue, he said the role of Mr Singh had become ''murkier'' who ought to tell the people of the country at whose behest he had gone to Kandahar and why he did not disclose so long about the mole in the PMO.

UNI KAS YA HS1652