MIRED IN THE TAPES

RAJASTHAN PHONE- TAPPING ROW

- Rohit Parihar

The phone-tapping controversy that has kept Rajasthan politics on the boil since the failed coup against Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot in July 2020 threatens to embattle him yet again after his government’s admission in the legislative assembly that phones had indeed been “intercepted”. While Gehlot’s detractors in the Congress and the opposition BJP say this contradicts his denials last August, the response in the assembly was, in fact, an iteration of the stand that the phones tapped did not belong to any political leader.

Yet, the issue has sparked a political storm, with the BJP forcing a debate in the assembly on March 17 and raising the matter in the Rajya Sabha on March 19. The party has demanded a CBI inquiry and Gehlot’s resignation. A senior Rajasthan police officer involved in the tapping explains: “Those in the government were casual in handling a sensitive question like this. They should have clarified that no politician’s phone had been tapped and that only conversations of suspected criminals were recorded, under the Indian Telegraph Act.”