Jaipur, March 26 (SocialNews.XYZ) : Crossing the state's borders, Rajasthan's phone tapping dispute has reached Delhi as Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat has lodged a complaint in the crime branch of Delhi Police in this case.
Police sources in Delhi confirmed that a complaint was received from Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat at the Tughlak Road Police station, one week ago, in connection with the phone tapping issue. The complaint was transferred to Delhi Police Crime Branch.
However, as Shekhawat is in Bengal at present hour, his statement could not be collected, said his team in Jaipur.
Shekhawat, in his complaint, has accused unknown police officers and Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot's OSD Lokesh Sharma, for allegedly tapping phones of public representatives and tarnishing their image.
Sources said that Delhi Crime Branch has appointed Satish Malik as the investigating officer.
They confirmed that the statement of Rajasthan state Parliamentary Affairs Minister Shanti Dhariwal has been made the basis of the formal complaint where Dhariwal admitted that the audio was made viral by the Chief Minister's OSD.
Shekhawat in his complaint said that the viral audio has damaged his reputation and disturbed his peace of mind.
His complaint further said that on 17 July 2020, many media groups of the country had aired the purported audio of a phone conversation between Sanjay Jain and Congress MLA Bhanwarlal Sharma which showed phone tapping was done without the permission of the Home Department.
The then ACS had said that he has no information about phone tapping and hence it was clear that phones were taped in an illegal manner.
The issue of phone tapping had been haunting the Gehlot government since the former deputy CM Sachin pilot opened a rebellion against CM.
In July, three audio tapes were released by the Gehlot camp after this rebellion in which purported negotiation between Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and Congress MLA Bhanwarlal Sharma was recorded.
The other tape claimed to be the voice of MLA Vishvendra Singh. However, the source and authenticity of these audio tapes remain disputed as Shekhawat continues to deny it being his own voice in the audio tape.A
On the other hand, Congress leaders are demanding Shekhawat to give a voice sample. Recently, in response to a question in the Legislative Assembly, the Government accepted that the phones were tapped after getting clearance from the officer of the competent level. The BJP created a ruckus in the Legislative Assembly on this issue.
Minister Shanti Dhariwal, while replying in the Legislative Assembly on the phone tapping case, had admitted that the audio regarding the MLA horse-trading was made viral by the Chief Minister's OSD. He said - the Chief Minister's OSD received audio on WhatsApp and he sent it to a WhatsApp group, so what was the crime?
However, the origin of audio remains disputed and there are no answers as to where did the audio come from? Hence the state government is facing allegations of phone tapping.
The matter was also raised in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha recently.
Shekhawat on March 15 had said that People of Rajasthan are raising a question - why was the phone tapping done using the government machinery to placate the internal rift of the Congress Party?
"Why did the Congress government use the administration in its own interest? This is an "illegal" process. Democracy murdered," he alleged.
Source: IANS
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