Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde on Thursday confirmed the commission of inquiry being set up to probe the snooping allegations against the Gujarat government and said there is no case of political vendetta against anyone.
"Today the cabinet approved the proposal to set up a commission of enquiry under Commission of Inquiry Act 1952 to look in to the allegations of physical and electrical surveillance in Gujarat, Himachal and NCR without authorization. The report will be prepared in 3 months,' said Shinde.
Shinde said only the cases which happened in Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat will be investigated by this commission.
"The snooping case has been in the media for the last one and a half month. A delegation of 47 ladies met the President of India and gave representation to enquire into. And the same representation was sent to the President's office for the home department to take action. And today, we brought the proposal to the cabinet and the cabinet has approved it," he added.
Reacting to Arun Jaitley's statement about a two-member commission already investigating the allegations, Shinde said, "The Gujarat commission is only for one state. This commission is being set for multiple states. So, there is no comparison between the commissions."
Denying the allegations of political vendetta, Shinde said, "There is no timing. When our papers got ready and we got all the information, then only we took a decision. There is no case of political vendetta here."
The Union Cabinet on Thursday cleared a commission, which will investigate the allegations of snooping on a woman and the misuse of state's machinery by the Gujarat Government, headed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.
The commission, which has been approved under Section 3 of the Commission of Inquiry Act of 1952, will investigate the charges of snooping against the Modi government, which is alleged to have happened in 2009.
News portals Cobrapost and Gulail had aired an alleged taped conversation between former Gujarat Home Minister Amit Shah, and police officer G.L. Singhal.
In the alleged taped conversation, Shah was instructing Singhal to closely monitor the movements of the woman referred to in the report as "Madhuri", not her real name.
Shah, who is currently heading the BJP election campaign in Uttar Pradesh, is alleged to have misused his powers and the state police machinery for the illegal surveillance of a young woman in August 2009 at the behest of his "saheb."
The Gujarat Government has set up a two-member panel of former judge Sugunaben Bhatt and retired bureaucrat K. C. Kapoor to probe the charges.
