Bring privilege motion against IT minister for 'misleading' house on Pegasus: LoP to Lok Sabha Speaker
India Today
Leader of Congress party in Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, wrote to Speaker Om Birla and demanded that a privilege motion be initiated against the Minister of Information Technology for deliberately misleading the House on the Pegasus issue.
Amid the latest row over the Pegasus spyware controversy, Congress MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Sunday to "demand that a privilege motion be initiated against the Minister of Information Technology for deliberately misleading the House on the Pegasus issue."
Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, sent the letter a day after a report by the New York Times claimed that Israeli spyware Pegasus and a missile system were the “centrepieces” of a roughly $2 billion deal of sophisticated weapons and intelligence gear between India and Israel in 2017.
“The Pegasus issue had rocked the monsoon session of the Parliament last year with the opposition parties demanding a discussion on the scandal that the Government was targeting political leaders, journalists, judges and civil society activists using spyware,” Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote.
He added, “The Government, on the floor of the House, always maintained that it had nothing to do with the Pegasus Spyware and it never bought the spyware from the NSO Group. The Modi Government also lied to the Supreme Court when it was directly questioned about the purchase and deployment of Pegasus. In a sworn affidavit, the Government said ‘unequivocally, we deny any and all of the allegations against the Government’ on the Pegasus issue.”
The New York Times report titled ‘The Battle for the World’s Most Powerful Cyberweapon’ said that Israeli spyware Pegasus and a missile system were the “centrepieces” of a roughly $2 billion deal of sophisticated weapons and intelligence gear between India and Israel in 2017.
The report also referred to PM Modi's visit to Israel in July 2017.
“For decades, India had maintained a policy of what it called ‘commitment to the Palestinian cause’, and relations with Israel were frosty. The Modi visit, however, was notably cordial, complete with a carefully staged moment of him and [then Israeli] Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu walking together barefoot on a local beach,” it said.
