NEW DELHI, November 5: Union Home Minister Indrajit Gupta has told Congress vice-president Jitendra Prasada that ``there is no need to threaten the government with some drastic step'' on the Jain Commission report since the government has ``every intention'' to table the report on the ``very first day'' of the coming Parliament session. On October 31, Prasada sent a letter to Gupta saying that he got the impression that the Government was trying to ``hush up the findings'' and that his conscience would force him to ``take some drastic step'' if the report was not tabled.

Yesterday Gupta replied to Prasada saying, ``there was no possibility of such a contingency'' and that the government intended tabling the report along with the action-taken report. ``However,'' Gupta added, ``it is incumbent on the Home Ministry to examine the report carefully from the point of view of security reasons.'' Earlier, the government had said that a committee of secretaries would examine the report and that the law allowed a period of six months from the submission of the report to its tabling in the Parliament.

Gupta is reported to have spoken to Prime Minister I K Gujral and the matter was also discussed informally among members of the Union Cabinet before it was decided that the report be laid on the table of the Parliament without delay. Gujral is said to have assured Sitaram Kesri that the government had ``nothing to hide.'' Prasada's letter to Gupta is being seen within his party as an attempt to move closer to 10, Janpath. In fact, Prasada wrote to Gujral and Gupta on September 17 and was told that the matter would be looked into by a panel of ministers and, later, by a panel of secretaries. In his latest letter, Prasada quotes another letter saying he had been told that the ``matter is currently under examination in the Home Ministry''.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.