'All I want is to clear my name.'

The former arms dealer told the Evening Press today he will serve a writ for damages on Chief Constable Della Cannings, and also Home Secretary Charles Clarke, in a bid to clear his name after being granted legal aid.

Bleach, a former pupil of St Peter's School, York, was jailed for life in 1995 for "waging war" against India after he and his Latvian crew were alleged to have parachuted rifles, grenades and rocket launchers to terrorists in West Bengal.

After two pleas to be pardoned were rejected, he was finally freed on health grounds in June 2004.

But he has claimed that he tipped off North Yorkshire Police about the deal in advance and that he was told to proceed with it.

He said: "All I am wanting is a public acknowledgement that I acted throughout the whole affair in good faith."

Ryedale MP John Greenway said: "I am quite sure they would not have agreed to this (to grant legal aid) if they did not think there was a case. Some people would ask why are they doing this, but the seriousness of the allegations is such that it might be best for this matter to be brought to court.

"All the way through this matter there have been suspicions that something was not right. It may be there's no other way to clear up this matter completely - not just for him, but for officers against whom allegations have been made and who would say they should be exonerated."

Mr Bleach claimed he had only ever wanted to help the authorities foil the arms drop, which took place in West Bengal ten years ago last month.

"Those arms were intended for terrorists to kill innocent people, and I've seen what terrorists can do in Northern Ireland," said Mr Bleach, who served in Northern Ireland decades ago in the Intelligence Corps.

He claimed he gave North Yorkshire Police full information about the operation in advance, speaking three times to officers in the autumn of 1995, and then fully expected the Indian authorities to mount a sting operation to catch the perpetrators.

But the drop went ahead. "How can it happen that a terrorist incident is reported to the police, and nothing is done?" he asked.

He claimed that after he was eventually detained along with the Latvian air crew, and later put on trial in Calcutta for his part in the drop, the force gave inaccurate information to the court, allowing him to be convicted of conspiracy to wage war.

"It was a long time before they (the police) would even confirm I had spoken to them at all," he claimed.

"If they had admitted it when I was first detained, I would never have been put on trial."

He claimed that even after the force made the admission, it implied he had been spoken to as a result of an investigation - when he had contacted the authorities to tell them about the proposed arms drop.

He said that the Latvians were released by the Indian government following an appeal by Russian president Vladimir Putin. But after Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and then Prime Minister Tony Blair had made a similar appeal on his behalf, the Indian government had initially turned them down, citing the evidence given by the force.

Mr Bleach, now 54, was finally freed after further pressure from the British Government.

He revealed that TB which had gone untreated in prison for two years had caused permanent damage to his lungs, and he was now registered as incapacitated until at least 2009 - although because he had been imprisoned in India for eight years and had not been paying National Insurance, he was not entitled to incapacity benefit.

Mr Bleach, who lives near Pickering, said that a complaint against the force, lodged with the Police Complaints Authority by supporters in 2003 before he was released, had still not been settled by its successor body, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).

He said he would be able to sue for damages after recently being granted legal aid. He stressed that the writ would go to the Chief Constable and Home Secretary as the current heads of the respective organizations.

A force spokesman said today: "We await hearing from him."

An IPCC spokesman said: "As far as the IPCC was aware, the complaint had been dealt with to the satisfaction of Mr Bleach by North Yorkshire Police.

"However, we have subsequently been made aware that that is no longer the case, and we have asked North Yorkshire Police whether they want to look at the complaint again."

When the fax came through to his office in July 1995, Peter Bleach claimed he thought very little of it.

But the document was to lead to an extraordinary chain of events culminating in eight years in a Calcutta jail, which he said could have cost his life and which only ended after an appeal for his freedom from no less than Tony Blair.

The fax requested a quote for the supply of 500 AK47 assault rifles.

For an arms broker, he claimed that was a pretty routine request. Governments and security services around the world wanted such weapons. But Bleach said he was deeply involved at the time in trying to get Home Office approval for Polish helicopters to be used by British police forces, and sent off a quote, not particularly expecting anything to come of it.

But then he claimed he got another fax accepting the quote, and travelled to Copenhagen to get a contract signed. That was when, he says, he got the first inkling that something was wrong. The customer told him that the arms were for sale to India, but were not to be taken to a Customs warehouse, as would normally apply with a legitimate deal, but somewhere inland.

"I knew immediately we were talking about a hooky deal," he said.

"I was a reputable arms dealer - if there is any such thing. I worked within the law, and I suspected these arms were intended for terrorists. I have worked in Northern Ireland (as a non-commissioned officer in the Intelligence Corps) and I've seen what terrorists do to innocent people."

He claimed that on returning to Britain, he contacted the Defence Export Services Organisation, a division of the Ministry of Defence, to ask for advice.

He said the organisation advised him to press on with the deal, and the appropriate authorities would get in touch with him.

He claimed in the following September, he received the first of three visits to his home by North Yorkshire Police, acting on behalf of MI5. He said the police told him in the October that the Indian authorities had been informed, and that he should continue with the deal, although he later discovered that the Indians were only informed a few days before the drop - too late for them to act.

He has disputed the police's assertion in 1997 that while he had tipped them off about the drop, they had clearly instructed him not to get involved.

He said he never intended to leave Britain, but then, through a series of complications, became more deeply involved, and flew first to Bulgaria and eventually to India, along with a Latvian crew and a cargo of AK47s and other weaponry.

He claimed he fully expected the plane to be raided on landing in India, but nothing happened, and he eventually found himself flying over a hilly area of West Bengal, where the guns were dropped from the hold and floated down to earth on parachutes. Because of miscalculations by the crew, they missed their targets by more than a kilometre, with some being found by the startled residents of a local village.

He said the Indian authorities still failed to act, and it was only days later, after flying first to Thailand and then returning to India, that he and the rest of the crew were detained. He claimed the authorities only realised what the plane had been involved in when he informed them of the facts.

Conditions in the prison in Calcutta were, he says, simply "dreadful, terrible".

He claims: "We were starving. The food each day was a small cup of rice. We would not have survived had it not been for the kindness of some of the other Muslim inmates. They would push plates of their food under the cage walls. They did not believe you should let a beggar go unhelped".

Mr Bleach says the help they gave him has left him determined to view all Muslims with an open mind.

He developed TB in the prison, but claims it went untreated for two years until the British High Commissioner managed to get a doctor in to examine him.

The disease was so advanced that he required very powerful drugs that left him feeling even worse, but eventually tackled the illness - although he said he has been left with permanently damaged lungs which recently led to him being registered as incapacitated.

Updated: 10:30 Monday, January 16, 2006