Congress diluting probe: Mulayam

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav seems to be fortifying himself for a long battle on the phone tapping issue by collecting p...

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav seems to be fortifying himself for a long battle on the phone tapping issue by collecting political friends and allies, apart from other ammunition, to fire away at his rival, the Congress Party, and its president, Sonia Gandhi.

Speaking in the Capital today at a press conference8212;the second on the same issue in five days8212;Yadav went on the offensive, accusing the Congress-led UPA Government at the Centre of 8216;Operation Cover-Up8217; on the phone-tapping issue. On Friday, Yadav had held a press conference in Lucknow to allege that Sonia Gandhi had ordered the phone-tapping of senior Samajwadi leaders like Amar Singh, Yadav8217;s brother Shivpal Yadav, and others.

8216;8216;The finger of suspicion points straight to 10, Janpath,8217;8217; said Yadav, as he questioned Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil8217;s dismissal of the case on the ground that the official letter asking for the phone-tap was forged. 8216;8216;How did the Home Minister conclude the letter was forged within hours of it becoming public,8217;8217; Yadav asked.

The chief minister then circulated the letters purportedly written by Ranjit Narayan, Joint Commissioner, Delhi Police, and R Narayanaswami, Principal Secretary, Home Ministry, to the media. He asked for an enquiry by a Special Task Force 8216;8216;as he could not rely on the CBI for an unbiased investigation8217;8217;.

If the Centre doesn8217;t agree to his demand for a STF probe, Yadav said he would appeal for an investigation to three non-Congress, non-BJP chief ministers8212;West Bengal8217;s Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, Tamil Nadu8217;s J Jayalalithaa and Bihar8217;s Nitish Kumar. He also pointed out that he, as the chief minister of UP, had not taken into confidence when an arrest was made in Noida in the phone-tapping case.

The chief minister also conjured the spectre of national security concerns when he asked, 8216;8216;If the phones of SP leaders can be tapped on forged letters, what is the guarantee that the same trick cannot be applied to obtain information about our nuclear programmes, secret defence matters, the Prime Minister8217;s Office and other sensitive departments?

8216;8216;I do not believe anyone should be interested in my personal life. It is of no consequence to the public,8217;8217; he said, cautioning non-Congress leaders to be alert as they could face similar 8216;8216;character assassination8217;8217; and said he would be talking to them in this regard.

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Asked why he targeted 10 Janpath, Yadav said the Congress president has been persistent in her attack to dislodge his government in Lucknow. 8216;8216;The Congress leaders know very well they cannot come to power in UP as long as the SP is in the state, and without UP, it the Congress cannot come to power on its own in the Centre,8217;8217; he said.