National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, PM Narendra Modi's go-to person in the government today defended the execution of 1993 Mumbai blasts convict Yakub Memon.


Doval said it the popular opinion that Yakub was hanged in the absence of his brother Tiger Memon, the mastermind of the attack, was wrong. Doval said this while delivering a lecture at Mumbai's Yashvantrao Chavan Centre, yesterday.


"It was completely wrong to say India could not catch Tiger and therefore caught Yakub. Yakub and Tiger are standalone. Inter linkage is incorrect," he said.


He also responded to Congress MP Shashi Tharoor's tweets in an indirect manner. "Someone tweeted me a statement by a leader in the evening, saying state-sponsored killing diminishes us all and reduces us to murderers. This argument means anyone acting in defence reduces himself to murderers," Doval said.

Doval pointed out that the state "had to protect itself"  "You cannot say someone has the freedom to carry out a terrorist act, but the state does not have the right to use its coercive instruments to deny him his life," he added.