KUALA LUMPUR. Dec 31: Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad stepped up a campaign to curb privileges of Malaysia's hereditary rulers on Wednesday by announcing fresh proposals to remove their rights enshrined in the constitution, reports Reuter.

Mahathir told reporters that as well as an earlier plan to strip the nine sultans of their immunity from the law, the government wanted to remove their power to pardon themselves and other members of royalty of criminal charges.

A third amendment to the constitution would be made to allow Malaysians .to lodge reports against the rulers, he said.

"We have to amend the Sedition Act and to restrict their powers to pardon to make the whole exercise effective," Mahathir said after meeting over 1,000 grassroot leaders of his Untied Malays National Organisation (UMNO) party.

They (the sultans) will not be allowed to pardon them-, selves or those close to-them,” Mahathir said.

UMNO, which has had an uneasy relationship with the sultans, recently launched a concerted campaign to curb their rights after a school hockey coach alleged Sultan Mahmood Iskandar Mahmood of Johor State, a former king, slapped hjm.

Ine issue has been widely debated in Malaysia and given unusual prominence in pro-government media

Sultan Mahmood was sentenced to six months’ Jail in 1978 for manslaughter but was pardoned by his father, the then-sultan, and did not serve the sentence for shooting an alleged smuggler from his helicopter.

Sultan Mahmood, 60, made a public call to his "loyal subjects” to meet him at his palace grounds on January 8 for a gathering which he said would not be for political purposes.