As regards the allegations of phone-tapping leveled by the MlAs belonging to the BJP and those of the rebel Congress camp and subsequent speculations over the Governor having shot off a missive to the police headquarters, asking police to conduct an inquiry into the issue, State DGP BS Sidhu said on Saturday that they had received no such letter from Raj Bhawan so far while vehemently denying that they had gone for any phone-tapping outside the procedural limits. “When we tap phone calls of a suspected criminal we follow certain procedures. Police do not tap phones, acting on a political motive,” the State’s top cop said.
It is worthy of mention that citing RTI—provided information, the State BJP principal spokesperson Munna Singh Chauhan had alleged a few days ago that the previous dispensation had phones of a large number of persons tapped for political or other motives. He had said that the phones of politicians, journalists and businessmen had been extensively tapped at the behest of the erstwhile Harish Rawat government as per the RTI revelation.
According to him, police accepted that they had destroyed documents related to phone tapping done till June 2015. Thereafter, they had tapped phones of 378 people, the BJP leader had said and added that this was a case of sheer breach of privacy. He had further said that the actual number of those being kept under surveillance might run into a few thousands.
Following the RTI revelation, State BJP had appealed to the Governor to constitute a probe into the matter. Chauhan had said that the gadgets should be sent to forensic labs for proper investigation. What is more, he had said that such things were continuing even under the President’s Rule. Even the rebel Congress MlAs had said the same, Chauhan had said while stressing on the need to have a probe ordered from the end of the Governor.