PEGASUS GAS

There is something disreputable about snooping. Like the cloying smell of old laundry that lingers in the air after sweaty assignations while the suspicious spouse frets and fumes, suspecting the truth and not happy to face it. Of all the underhand things that people do to one another, snooping is the most dishonorable. It betrays the deep insecurity of a voyeur with a cheque book, a secret consumer of political porn. They may arrest me for saying this, but it is not surprising for the Modi government, whose global democratic credentials are slipping by the day, to snoop on both independent and pet journalists, politicians of their own camp and opponents, an election guru, a Supreme Court judge, an Election Commissioner and businessmen. The names cover the entire gamut of forces that are supposed to act as a check on government arbitrariness—the media, the judiciary and the Election Commission. Since 2014, there were crucial judgments and elections that would shape the ideological and political contours of the country.

Nobody is buying the government’s defence that the timing is suspicious because disrupters in India are at work; the Modi government is only one of the many governments exposed as a peeping tom by a highly credible consortium of global media organizations

including WAPO and The Guardian. The most humiliating fact is that India is the only democracy in this toxic gang of autocratic regimes comprising Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Pegasus is a mythical horse, but sitting on a high horse isn't working for the government.

Sarkari denials are coming loose and fast, each more absurd than the other. Our redoubtable Home Minister played the foreign hand card, accusing western nations of being jealous of India and wanting to derail our development. Our development? Ahem. No comment. The obvious question to be asked by journalists is is it ok to spy on people without their consent at all? Rahul Gandhi’s dining room chat cannot be a threat to national security since he is of more use to the BJP than any ally. The BJP has denied evidence linking the government to illegal surveillance. Pegasus says its sells only to governments.

Recently sacked minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, who ran the IT ministry when the snooping began protested that over 450 governments are Pegasus clients, why single out the Indian government? The reason is that out of their 450 clients, the reports mention only the snoopers. Why comment at all?

Godi media ANI suggested that the whole shebang was a lie cooked up by the evil competitors of Pegasus to discredit the company. Not worth commenting.

There is no way out of this for the government to wriggle out of Pegasusgate. As most governments do when they are caught with their pants down, BJP will brazen it out, too. Snooping on political opponents, judges and even friends are common to governments. But in a Western democracy, no government can survive such a vast scandal. There is no danger of that happening here. This is a wakeup call for the prime minister who has courted world admiration assiduously. However, India’s rank slipped in the 'Freedom in the World Report 2021' from a 'free' country to 'partly free.' Last year, it slipped 26 spots to 105th position on economic freedom index and fell 17 spots on 2020 Human Freedom Index to 111th rank. Reporters Without Borders placed Modi among 37 'Predators of Press Freedom' with Kim Jong-un and Imran Khan. The government’s predictable response has been to cry wolf of a global conspiracy against India, though it is not exactly clear what is to be gained by such a plot. Instead of seeking consolation in national majesty in the past, the prime minister must look to his own past as the original development man and both regain and inspire confidence. With the kind of aides he has in government, who needs enemies? Paranoia is no substitute for governance or development.

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