‘Snoopgate’ judge to be named by May 16: Government

With just two weeks remaining for the May 16 counting of votes in India’s Lok Sabha elections, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has courted a major political controversy by saying that a judge will be named in the next few days to head the Commission of Inquiry into the “snoopgate” allegations against the Narendra Modi government in Gujarat.

“We will soon appoint the judge, before May 16,” Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde told a Press conference in Shimla, the capital of Himachal Pradesh, on Friday.

“I am worried. The way the chief minister of Gujarat had snooped into the personal life of a woman, I am really worried what will happen to the women of the country if he becomes the prime minister,” he said.

Shinde asserted that the appointment of a judge to head the commission, even as the election process is on, would not amount to a violation of the provisions of the model code of conduct because the decision in this regard had been taken by the union cabinet more than four months ago.

The Modi government had allegedly put a young woman under illegal physical and electronic surveillance in Gujarat in 2009.

The union cabinet had on December 26, 2013 decided to set up a Commission of Inquiry to look into those allegations as well as similar incidents in Himachal Pradesh and Delhi.

The alleged snooping first came to light when two investigative news websites, Cobrapost and Gulail, had on November 15 last year made public tapes which allegedly showed that BJP general-secretary and then Gujarat minister of state for home Amit Shah had directed police officials to put a young woman and a senior Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer under illegal surveillance in 2009.

In the tapes of the conversations, purportedly between Shah and police officer G L Singhal, the minister is allegedly heard instructing the latter to keep a strict watch on the woman, by deploying adequate numbers of policemen and intercepting her telephone calls. Later, new tapes released by Gulail in December 2013 allegedly showed that the woman, a young architect, was also spied upon in Bangalore.

According to Gulail, the 39 new audio tapes showed that the Gujarat home department had contacted its Karnataka counterpart in 2009 and sought authorisation to intercept the woman’s telephone calls.

The two websites had also claimed that the woman was put under surveillance at the behest of Saheb, which many believe is a reference to Modi. When the matter first came into the public domain, the BJP had claimed that the Gujarat government had only acted to provide security to the girl, a resident of Bangalore, who was at that time visiting Ahmedabad to be with her mother, who was to undergo surgery at a hospital there.

The father of the girl also put out at a statement saying that the security had been provided at a request made by him to Modi, with whom, he claimed, he had a long-standing relationship.

The BJP has, expectedly, reacted angrily to the latest move, saying that it was politically motivated, coming as it does just days before a new government is to be sworn in at the centre. “It is not snoopgate, but stoopgate,” fumed senior BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad, who alleged that it was an act of political vendetta and desperation.

Another senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley questioned the move at a press conference, saying it was unacceptable that the government should make such appointments when it had less than two weeks of its tenure left.

He said the executive should advise the government that such decisions were not as per the norms and traditions in place.

In any case, he said it was upto the new government not to accept such decisions.

Jaitley said that, with seven phases of polling over and only two more phases to go, it was quite apparent “which way the wind is blowing”. He said the trends from across the country were in favour of the Narendra Modi-led BJP and National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

Though the government had announced the decision to set up the Commission of Inquiry, a judge is yet to be appointed to head it because, according to reports, no retired judge was prepared to take up the assignment.

Media reports now suggest that the government is looking at changing the terms of reference to enable the appointment of a sitting Supreme Court or High Court judge to head the Commission.

Union Law Minister Kapil Sibal dismissed Jaitley’s claims that no judge was willing to “lend himself to the political and malafide exercise” against Modi. “You will get a snoopgate judge before May 16. I don’t know why these people are so worried? Why are leaders of the BJP so worried?” he asked.

Sibal said the BJP was worried because its leaders know that “once the commission is set up there is no saving Narendra Modi.”

According to him, there is documentary evidence against Modi and his aides in the case.

“They are worried about the Commission set up by the centre and, I think, they should continue to be worried because the Commission will be set up and he will be investigated and he will be brought to book,” he said. BJP leader Subramanian Swamy said his party would approach the Election Commission if the government went ahead with the appointment of a judge to head the commission.

— news@khaleejtimes.com

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