Narayanan was said to be a man keeping tab on every minister, officer and editor. He used to narrate the tales of how ministers and Prime Ministers asked him on various occasions to get intel about fellow politicians…
In the tussle between Raj Bhavans and Narendra Modi government, the former is giving up gradually.
From the list of UPA installed Governors, after BL Joshi (UP), Shekhar Dutt (Chhatisgarh) and Ashwini Kumar (Nagaland), West Bengal Governor MK Narayanan has finally resigned from his post.
A report in The Indian Express said the family’s belongings in Raj Bhavan were being packed. “A dinner hosted by the Governor on Saturday in honour of eminent educationist, Dr Karan Singh, who came to Kolkata for attending a meeting of Indian Museum, appeared to be his farewell dinner,” the report said.
Eighty-year-old Narayanan is not new to controversies. He was recently questioned by the CBI as a “witness” in the Agusta-Westland VVIP helicopter deal probe.
At the time the deal was being discussed in the UPA regime, Narayanan was National Security Adviser while Goa Governor BW Wanchoo was head of the elite Special Protection Group. The CBI believes they were present at key meetings where the specifications of the service ceiling were discussed.
It was for the first time that a serving Governor was questioned by an investigative agency in the country. The questioning took place for two hours where Narayanan was questioned on decisions to reduce the altitude at which the helicopters can fly.
Narayanan, a 1955 batch IPS officer, headed the Intelligence Bureau (IB) from 1987 to 1990, before heading the Joint Intelligence Committee. He became Chief of the IB again in 1991, before retiring in 1992. He was the Special Advisor for Internal Security to the ex-PM beginning in May 2004 and was appointed as the Governor of the West Bengal in January 2010 by the UPA.
He is alleged to plant his staunch supporters as RAW and IB chiefs. It is said that he systematically undermined the then RAW chief CD Sahay and planted his own man, Hormis Tharakan, former Kerala police chief who was occasionally deputed to RAW, as Sahay’s eventual successor afterwards.
It is also alleged that Narayanan never brought the video of former PM Raiv Gandhi’s assassination in front of the SIT investigating the matter. Former CBI officer K Ragothaman, who probed the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case and was the chief investigating officer, has claimed in his latest book “Conspiracy to kill Rajiv Gandhi – From CBI files”, that Narayanan wrote to then Prime Minister Chandrashekar making a reference to the video purportedly showing the assassin Dhanu at the public meeting at Sriperumbudur on the fateful day, but he later suppressed it.
The letter by Narayanan, published as Annexure in the book says: “Barricading in the site of the meeting (to be addressed by Gandhi) was rudimentary. Neither double nor effecting barricade was evident. It was hence possible for those in the unsterilized areas to have access to the sterilized zone.
It has not yet been possible whether the lady (assassin Dhanu) made her way into the sterilised zone once Rajiv Gandhi approached or whether she had previously managed to stand in line as one of those offering salutations to Rajiv Gandhi.
Video pictures of this part of the meeting are presently being scanned to try and identify the lady…”
The SIT had come to know of the video following a mention by the Justice Verma Commission (constituted to probe the assassination).
Former media advisor of ex-PM Manmohan Singh, Sanjaya Baru, has also mentioned Narayanan in his book “The Accidental Prime Minister”. He says: “Since Manmohan Singh’s PMO also included a special adviser, a novelty created to accommodate M.K. Narayanan, part of the NSA’s turf, namely the area of internal security, was hived off to him.”
As Baru’s book mentions, Narayanan was said to be a man keeping tab on every minister, officer and editor. He used to narrate the tales of how ministers and Prime Ministers asked him on various occasions to get intel about fellow politicians. “I have a file on you” was his famous line which sometimes unnerved the person in front of him.
This time, CBI is preparing a file on him. And all the secrets will come out in open soon.
