The BJP on Sunday accused the Congress-led Gove-rnment at the Centre of “mastering the art of manipulating CBI.”Drawing on the statement of CBI Director Ranjit Sinha, who had reportedly said that the UPA would have been happier if BJP leader Amit Shah had been chargesheeted in the Ishrat Jehan case, leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley said in an article that “process of manipulation of the CBI” should be “seriously examined”.
Jaitley said notwithstanding the withdrawal of the statement and “unconvincing clarification” by Sinha, “a voluminous evidence” was available with regard to “the pliability of the CBI even independent of his retracted statement”.
Sharply attacking the Congress-led coalition, he said that the UPA Government had in its decade-long rule “mastered the art of manipulating” CBI.
“The UPA during the period 2004-2014 mastered the art of manipulating the CBI. The CBI during this period was not controlled by the Government.
“Worse still, it was controlled by the ruling party,” Jaitley said, while calling for seriously examining the process of alleged manipulation of CBI by the UPA. He said a pliable person is selected to become the Director of CBI, which as an organisation is driven by its chief and he has the last word.
Jaitley said investigating officers prepare the investigation file with the idea of “inculpating or exculpating a particular person” and “internal checks and balances had completely collapsed”.
The BJP leader also alleged that the CBI directors were offered fresh jobs on the eve of retirement and a post-retirement job would be suggested to them and “this would contribute to their pliability”.
Jaitley recalled that he, in a detailed recent letter written to the Prime Minister, had mentioned exhaustive reasons of how senior BJP leaders like Amit Shah, Gulab Chand Kataria and Rajender Rathore were falsely implicated by the CBI.
He said in Amit Shah’s case the High Court while granting him bail observed that there was no prima facie case against him. The case against Gulab Chand Kataria, Jaitley said “was so palpably fake that special judge granted him anticipatory bail” and in Rathore’s case the special judge discharged him at the state of framing of the charge itself.
“Independent of the CBI director’s statement and the clarification, as the tenure of the UPA draws to a close, it may be helpful if the process of manipulation of the CBI is seriously examined,” he said.