“It’s emotional blackmail,” declares Prakash Kumar Thakur, basking in the attention brought by his court case against the tennis star. She has been asked by a court to appear before it on March 10.

“Yes I am happy,” says the 28-year-old property broker, and adds, “the admission means she knows she is guilty”.

In no mood to pardon the player, he says most sportspersons apologise only when court cases are slapped against them. “There is a growing tendency among sportspersons to show disrespect to the flag.”

Sachin Tendulkar and Mandira Bedi have been at the receiving end of this part-time social worker’s zeal to protect the dignity of the flag. The cricketer had cut a tricolour cake and the TV host had sported a sari festooned with national flags of several countries.

Asked what brought on this pro-activeness towards the flag, Thakur says: “I wanted to join the Army but my weak eyesight did not let me even attempt the career. I have a deep respect for the flag.”

Two years ago he met advocate R K Pandey, who had filed a case against M F Husain, again for insulting the flag, in a Bhopal court. Since then Pandey, who has filed three such cases of his own, has represented Thakur in court.

Sportspersons alone aren’t at the receiving end of Thakur’s appeal spree. He has also filed a case against a major publisher for “wrongly printing” the Tricolour in a Class VI book, and moved the court against the film Hanuman Returns. Pandey and he have made everyone from the film’s producer to Sharmila Tagore a party for joking about Hindu gods like Hanuman.

Recently, when a woman’s organisation calling itself the Lathi Brigade asked them to withdraw the case against Sania, saying the picture of her with her feet on a table that also sported a Tricolour was the result of trick photography, they too got slapped with a legal notice. Thakur’s charge is that their comment amounted to contempt of court.

Right now he is preparing for January 26 when, he says, most people, especially children, insult the flag by trampling upon it.

“Me and my friends will move around the city from 2 pm onwards on Republic Day collecting flags lying everywhere and destroy them in private with full dignity,” he says, quoting from the Flag Code of India, 2002. Like Pandey, he claims to have memorised the code’s provisions.

Thakur did Hindi (Honours) from an open university and dabbled in computer education before taking to the property business. And no, he or Pandey’s affiliations don’t lie with the Sangh Parivar. The two did try their hand at politics, but via the Nationalist Congress Party, a career that did not click.