The Centre, under attack for setting up an inquiry commission on the Snoopgate, defended its decision on Friday by questioning Opposition BJP on the fate of the post-Godhra panel headed by Justice Nanavati which had not given its report even after 11 years.
Defending the decision to set up an inquiry commission to go into Gujarat Snoopgate, Union law Minister Kapil Sibal accused BJP of “doublespeak”. “The Nanavati Commission was set up by Narendra Modi in order to help absolve himself of any wrong doing in Gujarat. Instead of four months, it has taken over 11 years and the inquiry report is still awaited,” Sibal wrote on his website.
Justifying the Centre’s move to step into the snooping scandal, Sibal said, “Setting up a Commission of Inquiry by the Gujarat government in relation to Snoopgate will meet the same fate.”
Certain Congress leaders felt that an inquiry should have been ordered earlier with Union Minister Beni Prasad Verma going to the extent of maintaining, “Modi would have been in jail”. Congress General Secretary Shakeel Ahmad posted on Twitter, “Snooping on the girl was done on behest of “Saheb” not only inside but outside Gujarat also. An all-India inquiry was a genuine need.” Congress had in a press conference earlier played out a purported conversation between Modi’s close aide Amit Shah and “Saheb”, claiming that “Saheb” was Modi.
On Thursday, Cabinet gave the nod for a Commission of Inquiry to probe charges of spying on a young woman in 2009 allegedly at the behest of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi along with separate charges of snooping on Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh by the previous BJP government when he was in the opposition as well as the leaking of the call data records (CDR) of BJP leader Arun Jaitley in Delhi. Sibal added, “It is ironic that BJP leaders are crying foul when they themselves asked for immediate investigation and arrest when call data phone records (of Jaitley) were accessed unauthorisedly. lack of consistency and doublespeak is BJP’s forté.”