‘State surveillance promoted by Congress govts’
‘Dhar’s book reveals Indira Gandhi relied on snooping and surveillance to assess her political gains and secure power.’
A scholar who keeps tabs on the chronicles of snooping and surveillance in the country has said that more than 10 books written by bureaucrats formerly associated with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) have exposedthe fact that it was not the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) but successive Congress governments that promoted a “surveillance state” in the country.
A recent notification of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has listed 10 government agencies for intercepting and monitoring information from any computer, and has attracted massive criticism. The Opposition, mainly the Congress and Left parties, have said that the notification will create a “surveillance state”.
Sidhheswar Shukla, fellow at the Makhanlal Chaturvedi National University of Journalism and Communication, said: “The first person accounts given by a number ofbureaucrats in their books have so far exposed the deplorable stories of blatant and brutal misuse of the Indian Intelligence, security and investigative agencies.”
“With technological advancement, the chances of snooping and surveillance have multiplied, but the first-hand accounts available have exposed successive Congress governments’ misuse of intelligence agencies for snooping and surveillance,” Shukla said.
The list of recently published books that have chronicled the stories about the misuse of intelligence and investigation agencies include former IB Joint Director M.K. Dhar’s book Open Secrets: India’s Intelligence Unveiled (2005); former CBI Director B.R. Lall’s book Who Owns CBI: The Naked Truth (2007); former CBI Director S.K. Datta’s book CBI Top Cop Recalls (2011); former CBI Special Director D. Mukherjee’s book CBI Headquarters: Victory or Mystery? (2013); former CBI Director Dr A.P. Mukherjee’s book Unknown Facets of Rajiv Gandhi-jyoti Basu-indrajit Gupta (2014); former CBI Joint Director M. Narayanan’s book Voice of CBI (2014); former R&AW official R.K. Yadav’s book Mission R&AW (2014); CBI’S former joint Director Shantonu Sen’s book CBI Insider Speaks: Birlas to Sheila Dikshit (2015) and former home secretary Madhav Godbole’s book Indira Gandhi: An Era of Constitutional Dictatorship (2018).
“For example, Dhar’s book, Open Secrets: India’s Intelligence Unveiled, published in 2005, revealed how intelligence agencies are often forced to serve the narrow interests of political parties and ensure survival of the leaders, who often equate the survival of the nation with their rooting for power. Dhar’s book reveals how Indira Gandhi relied on snooping and surveillance to secure her political gains and power,” Shukla told The Sunday Guardian.
“Similarly, the books by B.R. Lall and S.K. Datta have revealed that how the government at that time promoted a surveillance state. A.P. Mukherjee’s book presents an eye opener account of how the Congress government used snooping to get help to form government during the year of political flux in the country,” Shukla said.
Shukla said that the recent MHA notification is merely a list of names of agencies authorised to monitor; for that, powers were already available to these authorities in the Information Technology Act, 2000, introduced by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government in 2008.