Why launch a probe in snooping case when Gujarat already has an inquiry commission in place for the same? Throwing bunch of other cases to make it a viable case for inquiry puts the centre in the dock for abusing power.
Just when Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi was celebrating his win on twitter for clearing the (almost) last hurdle in front of him, the Central government launched probe in the Gujarat snooping scandal. The central government has proposed setting up of an enquiry commission in the case against Modi and his aid allegedly involved in the case.
Looking at the bad place that the central government has been in recently, we should call it a really bad timing. A large section of Modi supporters, whose number is only growing, was hailing the court verdict on Gulbarga society case in which Modi was exonerated and SIT’s closure report was upheld, will now see Congress abusing power to vent its anger over the clean chit given to him.
This also comes down from the simple fact that the SIT was set up by the Supreme Court and carried an unbiased probe which delivered the same result – no evidence against Modi – as the local courts of Gujarat.
The history of enquiry commissions with Modi has been inconclusive, just like the reports they presented.
R Jagannathan writes in his article, “It is worth recalling that the Justice UC Banerjee Commission was set up by Lalu Prasad Yadav to investigate the Godhra train fire even though Modi had already set up the Nanavati-Mehta Commission to look into both the train fire and the subsequent communal riots.
While the Nanavati Commission said that the Godhra fire was the result of a conspiracy by some Muslims, Banerjee’s interim report (the final one is still blocked in courts) claimed the fire may have started accidentally. Similarly, in the Gulbarg Society case, we have the SIT and the amicus curiae saying opposite things.
What these contradictory reports based on the same evidence in each case (Gulbarg and Godhra train fire) suggest is this: the evidence is clearly not conclusive against Modi in either case.”
But Modi is always held guilty for the failure his administration went through during the Godhara riots of 2002. And it all goes on while others (read Congress) guilty of open admittance to the massacre roam free.
Congress leader Digvijay Singh said, “I congratulate the central government. It should have happened much earlier because there is open violation of Indian Telegraph Act and Information Technology Act in this. Responsibility should be fixed in this matter.”
But BJP leader Arun Jaitley used strongest words against centre’s action. “It’s a phoney commission. You should understand the political context behind the allegation. Besides the so called snoop scandal, they had conspired to fix him (Modi) in three more case,” Jaitley said, referring to 2002 riots cases and alleged fake encounters of Sohrabuddin and Ishrat Jahan.
“It has been proved today that after 11 years of propaganda they could not implicate him in 2002 riots cases. Cabinet was aware that the judicial verdict would come today. This can be their calculation. It is a strange coincidence that Cabinet took the decision today,” Jaitley said.
Perhaps Jaitley is right in saying so because Congress’ action clearly indicates that it probably knew that putting hurdle against Modi was a big task. And so, it made another blunder of including other snooping cases to make it look like a multi-state affair so that t can have an excuse to launch a probe.
But while doing so, it included Jaitley’s own case illegal surveillance on his call details in the bunch, and chopped its feet. Jaitley slammed the centre saying that he never demanded any commission.
“It happened one year back and I never got any response from government and now they have included my case it make it a multi-state issue. That’s why I choose to call it a phoney commission. This is the grossest abuse of powers under the Commission of Inquiry Act,” he said.
In all, the government made a gross mistake by going overboard when Gujarat already has a commission set up for inquiry in the case. It just goes against the federal structure of power in the country. And it will also hurt Congress in terms of votes later on.
