The UPA government has been launching veiled attacks on the probe agency.
Just a day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh attended the CBI function showering words of praises and caution, promising to save it from the axe of oblivion, Finance Minister P Chidambaram asserted “in a lighter vein” that the agency “pretends to be victim” to get more autonomy.
Over the past three days, since the quashing judgment came from the Guwahati High Court, the UPA government has been launching veiled attacks on the probe agency.
After the Guwahati HC declared CBI an unconstitutional and illegal body, Law Minister Kapil Sibal had immediately come into its defence. Following his statements of “saving the CBI”, the government had filed an appeal against the judgment in the Supreme Court.
However, it was entirely government’s fault that the CBI fell into this mess as the government failed to produce the documents relating to the creation of the CBI. Its failure to save the agency in the first place left little to believe in the theory of saving it again given the fact that the agency has made the life of its central ministers, including the prime minister, quite tough.
When prime minister attended the CBI conference on tackling corruption, it was expected that he will hold the same line as his other ministers. But his statements one more thing clear that the caged parrot has left the cage.
What could be a better proof than the prime minister bashing CBI in its own function?
Although he “promised” that the government will “seriously” and “promptly” look into the legality of the agency, he also “adviced” the agency not to call a crime when there is “no evidence” of wrong doing. “Over time, investigating agencies in our country have been increasingly enquiring into administrative decisions and also matters relating to policy-making and such cases require great care in investigation,” he had said.
Chidambaram only extended what Singh had started. At the agency’s same conference, he said that the central investigating agency sometimes pretends itself to be a “victim” in its bid to get more autonomy.
The signs that CBI is out of government’s hands were further consolidated by his statements where he asked the agency to mind its own business. “It isn’t the investigating agency’s business to decide on rule of conduct, should confine itself to see if rule violated. CBI is part of the executive government. It is bound by the general rules as other wings of the government,” he said.
It is painful to see that the agency which has started gaining trust of the people due to its good work over the recent years earning it ire of the UPA government. But it is just a reminder to the people that the time to change has come.
