Staff Reporter
ITANAGAR, 22 Jul: The surveillance of phones of various political leaders, journalists and constitutional authorities, including lawyers, has sparked nationwide protests against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government at the Centre.
Joining the protests, the Arunachal Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) and the Arunachal Pradesh Youth Congress (APYC) on Thursday staged a peaceful protest in front of the Raj Bhavan here, demanding investigation into the surveillance of phones by the central government through the Israeli spyware Pegasus.
“Prominent people, Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi, Prashant Kishor and many political leaders, human rights activists, lawyers and even journalists have not been spared,” APCC general secretary Zirgi Kadu said, and demanded that the Supreme Court constitute
an independent committee under the supervision of the chief justice of India to investigate the case.
Kadu accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union Home Minister Amit Shah of jeopardizing people’s privacy and putting the country’s security at stake. He claimed that “Modi went to Israel to buy Pegasus to snoop on his own people.”
The APCC also demanded immediate resignation of Shah over the Pegasus spyware phone hack scandal, terming it an “illegal and unconstitutional act of hacking mobile phones.”
Slamming the union government, Kadu said that “both the constitution and the law are being throttled by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government.”
“Democracy is being trampled and the fundamental rights of the citizens are being suppressed,” said Kadu, adding that people’s right to privacy is being breached. He demanded a thorough investigation “as reports say that the list of surveillance included the mobile numbers of Rahul Gandhi, Prashant Kishor, and many others.”
The protest was staged maintaining the Covid SOPs issued by the state government, he informed.
