Eminent jurist Soli J Sorabjee justified the six year jail sentence for Sanjay Dutt and cautioned that no signal of any “celebrity justice delivery system” should emanate, because of the actor’s status and the support he is receiving  from some Congress leaders.

Mr Sorabjee also said that a sentence less than five years to the Bollywood actor would have been illegal, as he was convicted for a “serious offence”.

“...Because Mr Dutt is a popular star, a very important personality, his sister (Priya Dutt) is an MP and Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi and Kapil Sibal are speaking in his favour, no signal should go to the people that it is a celebrity justice delivery system,” he told Karan Thapar in ‘Devil’s Advocate’ interview programme.

Mr Sorabjee termed as “inappropriate” Mr Dasmunshi questioning the correctness of the judgement.

He justified the punishment awarded to the actor, saying, “he didn’t have a toy gun, he didn’t have an airgun, this is a serious offence...”

Though there are good grounds for the Supreme Court to grant expeditious bail, he said, “media hype could be counter-productive”.

“ Why all this in case of one person, what about others who are rotting in jails?”

Responding to a suggestion that  the public felt that the sentencing was excessive he said, “if public opinion is misinformed, I will ignore it”.

“Does the public know that the minimum sentence is five years and it cannot be reduced? Judge Kode would have committed an illegality, if he would have given him three years”, Mr Sorabjee said.