Pegasus saga: NCP fears foreign powers may be snooping on India
Darpan News Desk IANS, 10 Aug, 2021 11:39 AM
Mumbai, Aug 10 (IANS) Throwing a new dimension to the ongoing Pegasus spyware phone-tapping controversy, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) expressed deep apprehensions that some 'foreign powers' may be snooping on the country, here on Tuesday.
Terming it as "a very serious matter", NCP National Spokesperson and Minorities Affairs Minister Nawab Malik in Maharashtra said that the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled Centre must issue a proper clarification in Parliament.
"The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has said that it has nothing to do with the Pegasus matter. The Centre must make a proper statement in Parliament through some senior minister to the effect that the government has no links with the NSO Group Technologies," Malik urged.
He said that if the Centre's claim was indeed true, then it becomes even more serious as it could point to some foreign powers snooping on the country and its top institutions and individuals.
"The phones of several opposition leaders, Supreme Court judges, Election Commission of India, lawyers, journalists, industrialists have been tapped, but the MoD claims it has no links with Pegasus. Then who is responsible for this," Malik asked.
In view of this, the NCP leader said it was imperative for the Centre to immediately order a probe into the matter to reveal the truth, as the Congress demanded a statement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the issue.
Malik's comments came a day after the Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt informed the Rajya Sabha that the MoD has not had any transactions with the NSO Group Technologies of Israel, as Parliament deadlock continues with the opposition firm on a debate in the house.
Minister Abdul Momen said the 19-year-old girl - who fled Bethnal Green for Syria and is currently living in the al-Hol desert refugee camp in Syria - would be punished severely as the country has a "zero tolerance" for terrorism.
Lateef Tiger, a top Hizbul commander and a close associate of the slain separatist poster boy Burhan Wani was among the three militants killed on Friday by the security forces in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district, police said.
"From the behaviour of Shatrughan Sinha, it appears that although he has joined the Congress, but has not yet resigned from the RSS," Congress's Lucknow candidate Acharya Pramod tweeted.
In a letter to the Haryana DGP, the commission sought details of the case and asked the police to book the woman under relevant sections as soon as possible.
