Twitter and other social media platforms were set on "fire" minutes after this tweet from AAP Supremo and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal: "Modi is a coward and a psychopath". Some of the more bemused folks on Twitter pointed out that the correct spelling is "psychopath" and that its dictionary meaning is "a person suffering from chronic mental disorder with abnormal or violent social behavior". That's an interesting way of describing the Prime Minister of your country. This came when reports flooded in of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) raiding the offices of Rajinder Kumar, a 1989 batch IAS officer who happens to be the principal secretary of Kejriwal. Kejriwal, all other AAP leaders and followers and many opposition politicians are slamming this as not just misuse of the "caged parrot (a term used for the CBI by the Supreme Court in 2013), but is another instance of the "vendetta" politics being pursued by Modi and his NDA regime. The same allegations were levelled by crown prince Rahul Gandhi when he and his mother Sonia Gandhi were summoned as the accused by a trail court in the notorious National Herald case.
There will be enough written on both the subjects (including in this website). In the meanwhile, here is a checklist of examples where allegations of "vendetta politics" "politics of persecution" being pursued by the Modi regime. Those familiar with the language of Twitter know the words" RT does not mean endorsement. So the recounting of these alleged acts of vendetta and persecution does not mean that the author is endorsing the allegations. Of course, "intellectuals" are more than welcome to use this as a template to launch another round of "award wapsi"!
1) Greenpeace and Priya Pillai: Sometime back, Priya Pillai, an activist at Greenpeace was not allowed to travel to the United Kingdom because she was allegedly indulging in anti-national activities. The Delhi High Court took just a few months to order the government to remove her name from the "no fly" list. Meanwhile, the government has also cracked down on Greenpeace for violating Indian laws related to use of funds. All its bank accounts were frozen. A High Court Bench in Chennai ordered the government to "unfreeze" at least a few accounts so that Greenpeace could perform basic day to day functions. Subsequently, the registration of Greenpeace was cancelled. The Chennai High Court has provided interim relief even in this case. A final judicial verdict is awaited.
2) Teesta Setalvad: The manner in which the Supreme Court granted bail to Teesta Setalvad and prevented her arrest raised quite a few eyebrows in 2015. Teesta is a human rights activist who has been campaigning against the alleged wrongdoings of the Modi led government in Gujarat during the 2002 riots. In activist circles, she is the best known "face" of those who are implacably opposed to Modi. Some residents of Gulbarg Society, where former Congress MP Ehsaan Zaffri was brutally murdered by a mob filed a complaint with Gujarat Police that Teesta and her husband Javed Anand "cheated" them and misused funds acquired in the name of riot victims.
Apparently, Teesta had promised to erect a memorial museum at Gulbarg society and collected funds for the same. The memorial wasn't built. Subsequent allegations and investigations revealed that Teesta and her family "generously" used the funds collected for riot victims for personal expenses, including the purchase of wine and visits to the beauty parlor. The case is still going on and the Supreme Court has extended her protection from arrest.
3) Sanjiv Bhatt: This former IPS officer shot into fame during the second tenure of the UPA regime when he made sensational claims that Modi was responsible for much of the violence during the 2002 Gujarat riots. His "testimony" was accepted as gospel by activists, intellectuals and most sections of mainstream media who took this as further proof of their firm conviction that "mass murderer" Modi did not deserve to be Prime Minister. In 2015, the Supreme Court passed severe strictures against the conduct and behavior of Sanjiv Bhatt. He has been sacked from service. Yet, many Modi critics passionately believe that Bhatt is a victim of Modi vendetta. Incidentally, Bhatt's wife was a Congress candidate against Modi during the 2012 Gujarat assembly elections.
4) Ford Foundation: In April, 2015, the Union Home Ministry put Ford Foundation under a watch list of foreign donor agencies. Basically, the Home Ministry assed orders which said that all donations made by Ford Foundation will only be allowed after scrutiny by authorities. There were allegations that Ford Foundation, active in India since the early 1950s, had of late started "interfering in the judicial process" of the country, working to "disturb communal harmony" and finance anti national activities. Modi critics promptly pointed out that three of the biggest critics of the man and his regime: Arvind Kejriwal, Teesta Setalvad and Indira Jaising, were recipients of generous Ford Foundation funds. When Modi supporters pointed out that Ford Foundation was indeed in breach of Indian laws, they continued crying vendetta.
5) Virbhadra Singh: The chief minister of Himachal Pradesh, Virbhadra Singh has been facing allegations of serious corruption since the early days of the UPA-2 regime when he was the Union Steel Minister. Many corruption charges against him also date back to his earlier tenure as Himachal chief minister. The CBI has filed an FIR against him and investigations are going on. But Congress politicians and workers alleged vendetta when the CBI raided his house and started asking questions on the day his daughter was supposed to get married.
How credible and logical are the allegations that the Modi regime is pursuing vendetta politics in these five cases, not to speak of many others? What do you think?
