Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday joined the opposition in the phone hacking controversy, alleging that the Central government was snooping on his phone. He said he had received an email and a text message from the phone manufacturer Apple that his phone was being tapped.
“Why is the spying happening? Is it not a matter of internal security? The government will gain nothing by snooping, as people have decided to dislodge the BJP from power in the next Lok Sabha elections,” Akhilesh Yadav said while addressing reporters in Lucknow on Tuesday.
Several INDIA bloc leaders shared screenshots of an alert by Apple mentioning “state-sponsored attackers”.
The leaders, including Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, TMC’s Mahua Moitra, Shiv Sena’s (UBT) Priyanka Chaturvedi and AAP’s Raghav Chadha, shared screenshots of the said messages from Apple and hit out at the government, alleging snooping. The opposition leaders alleged that the government was trying to hack into their phones.
Akhilesh Yadav had made similar charge against the Central government in December, 2021. Ahead of the 2022 UP assembly elections, Akhilesh had accused the BJP of tapping the phones of SP leaders.
“The BJP knows that people of UP will vote it out of power, and therefore, it is taking all steps to limit people’s support that the Samajwadi Party is receiving,” Akhilesh said. He had earlier alleged the role of some of the IAS officers behind snooping and said that they were helpless while others were doing it merely because they were sycophants.