Modi turning country into banana republic: Yashwant Sinha

Nagpur: Former finance minister Yashwant Sinha has said that PM Narendra Modi was turning the country into a banana republic. “The removal of CBI director Alok Verma in the dead of the night was an illegal action. It was done with impunity as Verma was in the process of filing an FIR in the Rafale deal,” the senior BJP leader, who has been at loggerheads with his own party, alleged.
Sinha said the removal of Verma from his office and sending him on forced leave was directly linked to the Rafale deal. “Earlier this month, a petition signed by me along with Arun Shourie and Prashant Bhushan (lawyer) was submitted to the CBI. Since then, pressure was being mounted on the CBI director. We have been told that Verma was under pressure from the PMO over several matters including the Rafale probe,” said Sinha who was en route to Delhi after addressing farmers’ conventions in Amravati and Akola.

“A CBI director is autonomous and he cannot be removed from his duties by the government hastily. Only a selection panel comprising PM, Chief Justice of India and leader of opposition that appoints the CBI chief has the power to remove or take action against him,” said Sinha, a former bureaucrat turned politician.

“Persuading an official to go on leave and forcing him to take leave are different matters. First, the government with the help of a pliable media tried to project the upheaval in CBI and clash between Verma and special director Rakesh Asthana as a turf war. But that was not true as Verma and Asthana were not equal in hierarchical order. While Verma had a fixed tenure approved by Parliament, Asthana was inducted into CBI through back door thanks to his close ties with Modi and BJP president Amit Shah,” said Sinha.

He added that Asthana from Gujarat cadre was brought in by Modi to scuttle the Rafale and other cases going on against the government.

Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh and another BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha, who were accompanying Sinha, said the credibility of CBI was ruined by the government with its knee jerk reaction. Singh added that in May he had submitted a complaint to the Central Vigilance Commission on Rafale deal. The CVC had acknowledged that he was taking up the matter.

“It is obvious that any probe has to be done through CBI and its director was now thrown out as he was not towing the government line,” Singh alleged.

Shatrughan said he along with others were taking enormous personal and political risks by raising wrong doings of the Modi government.