'Snooping' on Rahul: Cong trying to make life difficult for Modi in Parliament - Firstpost

In 1991, Rajiv Gandhi was looking for an excuse to pull down Prime Minister Chandrashekhar’s minority government supported by the Congress. So, his party resorted to a familiar trick.

The Congress alleged that a police constable was spotted outside Gandhi’s house and that their leader was under surveillance. Within a few days, the party withdrew support to the government and precipitated a fresh election.

The Congress appears to be caught in a time warp. Almost 25 years later, it is trying the same-old trick for another Gandhi with the misplaced belief that what works once in politics can be used again and again as a weapon.

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But every brahmastra has a use-by date. The Congress allegation that the government is snooping on Rahul Gandhi in his absence has turned into a desperate bid to throw mud at the Narendra Modi government. But the party’s attempt is so feeble and its argument so shallow that the Congress MPs are looking like illogical, irrational troublemakers pre-programmed to disrupt Parliament.

Yes, Modi is famous for keeping a close watch over bureaucrats and politicians. Some of the incidents mentioned by Mallikarjun Kharge in the Parliament, like the alleged dressing-down a minister got from the PM for wearing jeans, have indeed been in circulation in Delhi. The fear of being watched and overheard keeps many in the government on their toes.

But the Rahul episode is a classic case of much ado about nothing. In India, it is a common and established practice to profile people who are politically important or hold positions of importance. Even in routine cases, like the elevation of a lawyer to the position of a high court judge, the police conduct routine security checks and updates.

As finance minister Arun Jaitley pointed out in the Parliament on Monday, this is part of “transparent, security profiling and not associated with any kind of snooping or spying." He said 526 persons have been profiled using the present form, including several senior BJP leaders, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and President Pranab Mukherjee (while he was in active politics.)

Jaitley dispelled even the minutest doubts by clarifying that every detail sought by the cops in the form is important. He even explained that the size of Rahul’s shoes was sought because of the unfortunate incident involving his father Rajiv, who was identified only because of the make and size of his footwear when he was assassinated by a suicide bomber in 1991.

Jaitley’s explanation is comprehensive, logical, detailed and supported by data. If the Congress has a modicum of political acumen, it would end the farce over ‘snoopgate’ and move on to something more important and tenable.

There is growing suspicion among political analysts that Congress leaders were aware that the allegations of snooping against the Modi government will not survive scrutiny. A party that has run the government at the Centre for a decade and the machinery in Delhi for 15 years is unlikely to be ignorant of the security protocol for VIPs.

But the Congress appears to have made up its mind to make life difficult for Modi in Parliament. In its attempt to paralyze the Parliament, the Congress has decided to hit the government with whatever it can, even with imagined threats and baseless allegations. The idea is to just not let the government function or dominate headlines.

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  Snooping on Rahul: Practice of seeking intrusive information should be junked

  
  
  
  

The Congress has realised that the Budget session is on the verge of becoming a wash-out. Apart from the insurance bill and some other pyrrhic legislative victories, the government doesn’t have much to show on its report card. So, the Congress—aided by a united and bellicose opposition—is denying Modi the opportunity to reset the agenda.

There is, of course, the added advantage of keeping Rahul in the news even when he is missing from the scene. Since Rahul prefers the backbenches and hasn’t shown any inclination to dominate the political discourse with cogent arguments or interventions in Parliament, it suits the Congress to keep him on top of the news cycle with facile stunts like the ongoing brouhaha over police profiling.

Even the die-hard sycophant doesn’t expect Rahul to hog headlines with a stirring speech on something like the land acquisition bill, so his cronies have no choice but to fill replace their master’s voice with their puerile piffle.