Gujarat govt, BJP slam Chidambaram’s bid to boss around Gujarat

Ahmedabad, 29 July, 2011

The UPA Government’s attempt to open a new front against the Narendra Modi Government by suggesting the officers to approach the Centre if they felt victimised by the State regime has brought Home Minister P Chidambaram in the line of BJP fire.

The Gujarat government today hit out at Union Home Minister P Chidambaram for his statement on the issue of IPS officers, saying “this attitude is dangerous to federal governance of the country”.

The state government has also alleged that Congress could go to any extent to topple a democratically elected government.

Chidambaram had expressed concern over Gujarat government’s action against couple of IPS officers and said if the affected officers want, Centre could intervene in the matter.

The Centre’s ‘offer’ to rebel Gujarat officers came on a day when the Gujarat High Court rejected IPS officer Rahul Sharma’s petition seeking details of the grounds on which he was served a show-cause notice by the State Government for providing phone call records related to the 2002 riots to the Nanavati Commission and the Special Investigation Team, without government authorization.

Chidambaram said the Modi Government’s action against IPS officers Sanjeev Bhatt and Rahul Sharma was a “matter of concern”. He told the media here on Friday, “Rules do provide for the Central Government to take decisions at certain stages but that stage has to be invoked by the officer concerned. If the officer concerned invokes the rule, certainly we will look into it.”

Senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley cautioned the Centre against acting like a “big brother” and destroying the federal structure of the country.

“If officers of a State Government are indulging in any indiscipline, it is for the State Government to deal with them. The Central Government is not the big brother that can intervene in these matters,” Jaitley said. The leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha added his party would raise the issue very seriously if there was unnecessary interference by the Centre in Gujarat affairs.