NEW DELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday fired a fresh salvo at former home minister P. Chidambaram over the alleged changes that he made in the affidavits of the Ishrat Jahan case and dared the former not to evade questions and respond to the queries raised in this regard.
Union Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told ANI that Chidambaram, because of extraneous political conditions, had sought a compromise in a matter that had national security implications.
“The crucial issue is that why Mr. Chidambaram evading, namely, why did he order a change in the affidavit when the process is sought to compromise national security. In the first affidavit in case of Ishrat Jahan it was clearly stated it was a LeT operations terror model including of Pakistan and therefore right action was taken,” said Prasad.
“In the second affidavit Chidambaram by passes the Home Secretary all other officers and orders if the government of India has no objection for a CBI enquiry and in the process purely because of extraneous political conditions the entire security establishment was sought to be compromised that is the real issue. I would ask Mr. Chidambaram to respond to these burning questions which are very relevant,” he added.
Chidambaram yesterday alleged that the affidavit controversy related to the Ishrat Jahan encounter case was only an attempt to divert attention from the real issue.
"Real issue is whether there was fake a encounter & whether FOUR people already in custody were KILLED in that FAKE ENCOUNTER. Coming to the affidavits, the Home Minister does not sign affidavits. It is signed by an Under Secretary," he said in a series of tweets.
"Although I have no recollection of seeing the first affidavit, let us presume that I did. Then came the report of Magistrate SP Tamang. This report caused uproar and there was demand mainly from Gujarat that Government of India should clarify or dispel misinterpretation being placed on the first affidavit. This is why a Second, short affidavit was filed!" he added.