Hindutva, Hindunasjonalisme og Bharatiya Janata Party En ...

The JP movement that preceded the declaration of Emergency was principally aimed at
exposing corruption in the Congress governments at the Centre and in States.
Around the same time, the judgement of the Allahabad High Court nailed the corrupt
electoral practices in the constituency of the Prime Minister herself, and disqualified her
membership of Parliament. The Prime Minister’s response to this gathering challenge to
her leadership was to clamp Emergency, suppress independence of the judiciary, muzzle
the press, and imprison anybody who dared to voice protest.
UPA Corruption scandals
As I said earlier, the Opposition is far stronger now than in 1975 and the Congress
leadership is far weaker today than in 1975. Nevertheless, the latter’s mentality when it
comes to the issue of corruption bears ominous resemblance. For example, take the
three major corruption scandals that have surfaced in the first two years of the UPA
government: (a) Quattrocchi scandal (b) Volcker scandal (c) Scorpene submarine
scandal.
How the UPA government enslaved the CBI and subverted other institutions of
governance to gift Ottavio Quattrocchi, the Italian fugitive, not only freedom but also 20
crore rupees of impounded money in the Bofors scam is brazen beyond words.
In Iraq’s food-for-oil scam, neither the Congress president nor any party office-bearer
has so far broken their silence on how the Congress party’s name figured in the Volcker
report as one of the recipients of slush money. No less a person than the country’s
former external affairs minister, whose name also figured in the report, has publicly
complained that he has been made a scapegoat. Shri Natwar Singh has pointedly asked
why no one from the Congress party has been questioned in the scandal.
The last of the three scandals – the Scorpene submarine scandal and the related scandal
of the “War Room Leak” in naval headquarters — has now resurfaced with a bang. On
Friday (June 23), the CBI conducted simultaneous raids at 19 places in New Delhi and
three other cities. Several serving and retired Navy and Army officers, and also
bureaucrats in the ministry of defense, have been named. This is very ominous. More
importantly, the CBI has also raided the offices and farmhouse of a well-known
businessman who, according to in-depth media investigation so far, is the mastermind
both in the ‘War Room Leak’ case and also in the Scorpene submarine deal. I welcome
the CBI’s action. Though belated, it has vindicated the stand taken by the National
Democratic Alliance in this matter. We had charged that the government was guilty of a
cover-up. We are proved right by the murky details that are now surfacing week after
week.
All along, the government maintained on the one hand that there was nothing serious
about the leakage of secrets from the naval headquarters. On the other hand, both the
government and the Congress party continued to insist that the “War Room Leak” had
nothing to do with the Scorpene deal. Now, the CBI itself has confirmed that the ‘War
Room Leak’ is part of a “much larger conspiracy” impinging on vital aspects of India’s
national security.
Today, as we remember the nightmarish period in the life of independent India, let us
rededicate ourselves to the mission of preserving and further enriching our democratic
system and our democratic way of life. A very important part of this mission is to
strengthen the fight against corruption and also against that mindset in a section of our
political class which places self-preservation above the rule of law.
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