The Chief Minister of Rajasthan Ashok Gehlot has acknowledged that phones were indeed “monitored” eight months after “leaked” phone calls between a Union Minister and Congress leaders in Rajasthan caused political controversy in the state and led to reports of illicit phone taps.
The confirmation, which was reported on the Rajasthan Assembly’s website in response to a query posed to the government during the August 2020 House session, contradicts previous statements made by both the government and the Chief Minister directly.
After initially denying charges, the Rajasthan government’s Home Ministry has now confirmed that phones were tapped in the desert state last year in a written response to a query in the state Assembly.
Though the response did not state that it had tapped the phones of Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and supporters of former Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot following a revolt in the Congress last year, the BJP linked it to the incident and requested a CBI investigation.
“Is it true that phone tapping cases have come up in the last days?” asked BJP MLA Kalicharan Saraf, who was Health Minister in Vasundhara Raje’s administration. If so, under what statute and on what authority? Place full info on the House table.
Satish Poonia, the BJP’s Rajasthan leader, has requested a CBI investigation into the matter. “Emergency is ongoing in Rajasthan,” the BJP declared in July of last year. The Gehlot administration first denied it, but now admits that the phones were tapped. Shekhawat tweeted, “It is a breach of anonymity, the assassination of democracy.”
“There is a national outrage as to why government equipment was used to tap phones in order to quell the Congress Party’s internal revolt. Why did Congress use the administration to further its own goals? He said, “This is an illegal operation.”
The crisis in the Rajasthan Congress and its government started in July 2020, when “leaked” recordings of phone conversations between Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, then-Rajasthan Tourism Minister Vishvendra Singh, and Congress MLA Bhanwar Lal Sharma, among others. A day after the audio clips went viral, the Rajasthan Police Special Operations Group used them to file an FIR against Shekhawat and Sharma, among others, for reportedly threatening to destabilize the state government.
