Politics of accusation against Modi must end
Now that the Supreme Court has rejected a petition demanding an investigation into the Sahara-Birla diaries which mentioned the names of a host of politicians, the earthquake that Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi wished to bring upon the ruling party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, will have to wait for another day! It's clear that the Congress and its leader either don't do their homework or are so obsessed with their anti-Modi campaign that they cannot see the writing on the wall. What the two-judge apex court Bench said about the material before them, applies to the Congress as well. The court observed that “loose sheets of paper” cannot form the basis of “admissible evidence”. Similarly, loose talk cannot be a ground for demanding answers from the country's Prime Minister. Caught on the back foot after the court rejected a plea by non-governmental organisation Common Cause with connections with the Modi-baiter activist and lawyer Prashant Bhushan to order a probe into the names of certain politicians including Prime Minister Modi in the dairies seized during a raid by authorities from the Sahara and the Birla groups, Congress spokespersons have now begun demanding answers from the Prime Minister on grounds of propriety. But what is there for the Prime Minister to respond to when the highest court of the land has stated there is no substance in the material to even order an investigation, let alone hold anyone accountableIJ It's time for the Congress to give up its futile attempt to box Modi into a corner. The Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi will have to look for some other issue. However, given the bankruptcy of ideas that both suffer from, coupled with their desperation to embarrass Modi, it is unlikely that they can come up with anything cogent, more so in time for the upcoming Assembly elections.
Meanwhile, the likes of Prashant Bhushan too must abandon a quest that has neither credibility nor substance. Bhushan may have his agenda which he is at liberty to pursue. But he is a reputed activist and lawyer too, and he must have known that he was on slippery ground. The flimsiness of the material he had became evident during an earlier hearing itself when the Supreme Court had advised Common Cause to withdraw the plea if it could not bring forward credible material. Clearly the NGO, and Bhushan despite his attempts at digging dirt, failed to satisfy the Bench. In throwing the petition out of the window, the court said that “such materials do not classify as evidence as required under Sections 65 and 65A”. Nor was the so-called proof the petitioner offered “cogent”. The Bench observed that, if courts were to begin cognizance of such “random entries”, the process of law could be “abused easily to achieve the ulterior objectives”. ‘Ulterior objectives' is exactly what Bhushan and company had in mind when they brought the case. Having failed to malign the Prime Minister through dubious material, Prashant Bhushan is now lamenting about ‘failure of justice'. His remark that the verdict was a “setback to the whole campaign against corruption”, is laughable; demonetisation was a campaign against corruption, but did Bhushan back itIJ And his comment that the judgement is a “black mark” on the apex court, is shocking.