Pegasus snooping row: Opposition MPs protest in Parliament complex; demand SC-monitored probe

Rahul Gandhi accused PM Modi of committing treason, and demanded that home minister Amit Shah resign

Several Opposition MPs, including Congress' Rahul Gandhi, on Friday protested against the government inside Parliament complex over the Pegasus snooping issue and demanded a Supreme Court-monitored judicial probe into the matter.

Besides Gandhi, a host of senior Congress MPs like Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, party's leader in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, K C Venugopal and Shashi Tharoor, DMK's Kanimozhi and Shiv Sena's Priyanka Chaturvedi, were present during the protest in front of Mahatma Gandhi's statue inside Parliament complex.

Carrying a banner which read "#PegasusSnoopGate We demand Supreme Court Monitored Judicial Probe", the MPs raised slogans like "ye jasoosi bandh karo (stop this spying)".

Also read: Chidambaram slams Modi govt on not probing Pegasus like Israel, France

"Pegasus is classified by the Israeli state as a weapon and that weapon is supposed to be used against terrorists. The prime minister and the home minister have used this weapon against the Indian state and our institutions. They have used it politically, they have used it in Karnataka..," Rahul Gandhi told reporters.

"The only word for this is treason,” he said. The matter has to be investigated, the former Congress president said. “A judicial inquiry monitored by the Supreme Court should be conducted and the home minister must resign," he said.

Opposition parties have stalled proceedings in Parliament alleging the union government's involvement in the alleged snooping following reports that nearly 300 mobile phone numbers including of journalists, activists, opposition leaders from India and even of union ministers figured in a list of potential snooping targets by Israel's NSO group which sells its Pegasus spyware only to "vetted" governments and government agencies.

The government and the ruling BJP have dismissed the Pegasus Project reports as concocted and evidence-less.

The media reports have been published by The Wire in collaboration with 16 other international publications including the Washington Post, The Guardian and Le Monde, as media partners to an investigation conducted by Paris-based media non-profit organisation Forbidden Stories and rights group Amnesty International.

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