Chandrakant Jairam Sawant was appointed the state's advocate general on April 4, 1995 immediately after the Shiv Sena-BJP government came to power and has to his credit a string of high-profile cases fought on behalf of the state. These include the Sahara case where the Supreme Court recently dismissed a special leave petition filed by the Bombay Environmental Action Group (BEAG) challenging the Bombay High Court's declaration that Sahara India's Amby valley project was environment-friendly.

His other cases included the numerous challenges to the SRD scheme, the challenge to Arun Bhatia's transfer, the Girish Vyas case which cost former chief minister Manohar Joshi his job, the challenge tothe state's police encounters which were alleged to be `fake' and the recent `protection' plea of criminals like Arun Gawli and film producer Ramesh Sharma.

In fact, Sawant enjoyed the last case mentioned, the most. Speaking to mediapersons in his chamber in an informal chat today, Sawant said that he enjoyed assisting the court in the interpretation of the fundamental rights under Article 21 where he had argued that criminals cannot demand state protection as a ``matter of right.''

Asked about his interaction with the erstwhile alliance government, he told Express Newsline that he had not ``pursued any policy of the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party.'' Remarking on the legal counsel he gave to the state, Sawant said that the state government had been ``most responsive'' to his advice and gave an example when Maharashtra governor Dr P C Alexander had asked for his advice on a bill that was passed by the House.

This bill had sought to restrict the number of children of local councillors and people'srepresentatives to two. The bill had proposed that if a councillor had more than two children, he or she would automatically lose his or her seat. Sawant had advised the governor that the bill might not be able to stand the test of legality as it seeks to overrule the personal laws of several communities. Ultimately, the bill was never assented to by the Governor, and was never pressed by the state government.

Stressing that his achievement was that he had maintained good relations between the executive and the judiciary, Sawant remarked that ``no government would be able to function if it did not pay attention to the pressing litigations in the courts.''

Sawant claimed that he had prepared his resignation when the new Congress-NCP government was sworn in, but was asked by Deshmukh to carry on till it came to grips with the administration.