Lokesh Sharma stated the previous Rajasthan chief minister must be interrogated.
New Delhi/Jaipur:
In a growth that would land former Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot in hassle, his ex-officer on particular responsibility (OSD) Lokesh Sharma has held him liable for cellphone tapping through the political disaster within the state in 2020.
He stated Mr Gehlot must be interrogated on this regard.
Delhi Police questioned Mr Sharma on Wednesday in reference to the phone-tapping case lodged on a grievance by Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat.
After the questioning, Mr Sharma stated he submitted a seven-page written assertion, describing the sequence of occasions on July 16, 2020, when he obtained a pen drive containing name recordings from the then chief minister for circulating to the media.
He stated Mr Gehlot might inform how he obtained the decision recordings and whether or not the decision interceptions have been finished legally or not.
Mr Sharma’s declare this time has marked a shift from his earlier stand that he had obtained three audio clips from social media and forwarded these to media homes.
Mr Sharma was known as for questioning at Delhi Police’s Crime Department workplace at Rohini. He reached there round 11 am, officers stated.
Mr Sharma, in April this yr, had publicly alleged that an audio clip of a purported telephonic dialog between Mr Shekhawat and a few Congress leaders on “toppling” the then Congress authorities in Rajasthan in 2020 was given to him by the previous chief minister himself.
At this time, he talked about this within the written assertion.
“I’ve acknowledged that the then chief minister had known as me on the chief minister’s residence and gave me a pen drive. He directed me to flow into the content material of the pen drive to newspapers.
“I went house, transferred the recordsdata from the pen drive to my laptop computer and from laptop computer to my cellphone, then circulated them to media homes as directed,” he advised PTI.
He stated the crime department ought to now summon Ashok Gehlot for questioning to know the remainder of the small print.
“The subsequent course of investigation ought to contain Ashok Gehlot,” he stated.
Mr Sharma stated that he was not concerned within the name interceptions.
“It was finished on the instructions of the then chief minister. Now he can disclose additional particulars, how the interception was finished, and whether or not it was authorized or unlawful,” he stated.
Mr Sharma claimed that telephones of a number of Congress MLAs, from each camps of Ashok Gehlot and Sachin Pilot, have been intercepted on the instructions of the chief minister through the political disaster and he used to get a transcription of every name.
He stated the then chief secretary, DGP, house secretary and principal secretary to the chief minister have been all conscious of the developments associated to cellphone tapping.
The phone-tapping controversy erupted in July 2020 throughout a political disaster when the Congress was in energy in Rajasthan.
The disaster was the results of a rise up by the then deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot and 18 different Congress leaders towards the management of Mr Gehlot.
Through the disaster, clips of alleged telephonic conversations between Mr Shekhawat and Congress leaders surfaced, following which Mr Gehlot had alleged that Mr Shekhawat was behind the tried toppling of his authorities.
Mr Sharma had circulated the clips purportedly containing conversations in regards to the plan.
In March 2021, Delhi Police registered an FIR towards Mr Sharma on costs of legal conspiracy, legal breach of belief and unlawfully intercepting telephonic conversations on a grievance by Mr Shekhawat.
That is Mr Sharma’s sixth look earlier than the Crime Department for questioning. He was final quizzed by Crime Department officers on October 10, 2023.
(Apart from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is revealed from a syndicated feed.)
