By Abdul Basith MA, TwoCircles.net,
Thiruvananthapuram: Over 250 eminent Muslim politicians and journalists are under cyber surveillance in Kerala, The Madhyamam Weekly has claimed in its latest edition of 16th Jan. Chief Minister Oommen Chandy of present UDF led Kerala government, is handling the home affairs.
According to the exclusive report of the Malayalam weekly, 268 e-mail accounts have been subjected to surveillance by the Kerala state intelligence, out of which 258 belongs to Muslims. It is said that none among them had any previous criminal backgrounds and so there is no clarity as to why they were put under surveillance.
The scoop done by Madhyamam’s Viju V Nair has prompted harsh condemnation of the government by Muslim organizations. The Muslim organisations of the state demanded CM’s explanation, after which he ordered an urgent probe. The government, however, has rejected the charge.
According to the scoop, Muslims from various spheres of social life in Kerala were under the state surveillance. They were denied of their constitutional rights and privacy of their personal life. The victims include Muslim politicians, Muslim journalists, professionals and even students.
The list includes Indian Union Muslim League [IUML] leader PV Abdul Vahab, an ex-Member of Parliament as well. The interesting fact is that, the IUML is a strong ally of the UDF led Kerala govt. The Muslim Media professionals working in Malayalam news dailies like ‘Mathrubhoomi’, which were not under Muslim ownership too found a place in the list. So the most astonishing fact regarding the leakage issue was that “the surveillance seemed accurate and specific towards ‘Muslim names’ residing in Kerala.” Outside the state, Prof. SAR Gilani, acquitted in the Parliament attack case was the only one to find a place in the list.
With the Muslim organisations demanding explanation from the home ministry; the CM called an emergency meeting of the home department and the top Police officials to discuss on the situation. The additional chief secretary of state home affairs K Jayakumar, in his statement denied the accusations, saying that the Home department hasn’t directed the police to carry out such surveillance activities. He demanded a probe into the sources of this scoop report as well.
On the other hand, the Madhyamam story says it was on November 3rd the Additional DGP Hemachandran received a letter from Police Superintendent KK Jayamohan; enlisting those names whose mail accounts were to be monitored. The letter demanded detailed monitoring of their e-mail IDs by collecting the login details from the service provider. The list included 159 Google mail, 63 Yahoo mail and 23 hotmail users. The high tech crime enquiry cell of the Kerala Police headquarters, were the ones entitled to carry out the task as the top police officials believed that the special branch was not that equipped technologically, to deal with the case.
This surveillance activity is carried out, on the basis of the information technology amendment act passed in parliament in 2008. The act allows the central, state govt’s and its agencies to leak any of those mobile or online communications carried out by the citizens, without any prior warning.
The story has caused widespread protests in Kerala. The Muslim organisations demanded explanation from the CM citing that, the police won’t be carrying out such surveillance activities without prior awareness of the Home department.
Solidarity Kerala termed the surveillance – a denial of constitutional rights and expressed their grave concern on the fact that 258 out of those 268 citizens subjected to surveillance are Muslims and they don’t even have a petty case registered against them. They warned the government regarding those worst consequences this community specific targeting could bring about. The youth movement demanded explanation from the ruling ally IUML, as their leaders too were victims to this surveillance. They termed it the last among those attempts from the part of authorities to brand Muslims as terrorists.
The SDPI Kerala accused the state govt and police of carrying out heinous conspiracies; as along with Muslim based dailies like Madhyamam and Thejas, the IUML [the UDF ally] owned news daily Chandrika and its politicians too were subjected to this mysterious surveillance. Meeting the press, state president Nasarudheen Elamaram demanded citizens to be alert and awake. He said this incident have been the first of its kind in the history of Kerala. He added that this is an obvious attempt to scrutinise and keep apart eminent, efficient personalities of the community from their tasks. He warned the authorities of mass protests, if the privacy is not restored by immediately stopping similar such surveillance activities and by strict punishment to those guilty.
Popular Front of India [PFI] stated that their long time doubts and statements regarding the anti Muslim elements within the state police have turned true now. They asked the Kerala govt to clear its stand on whether they are with those forces spreading Islamophobia globally. PFI asked IUML to explain its stand, as they too are at present in the black list of the state government, to which they are a significant part as well.
Apart from being a surveillance activity targeting the Muslims, the Madhyamam report points towards even worst attempts from Intelligence agencies by creating their own screen plays to target those involved in the list. By logging into an innocent Muslim’s e-mail account these officers could sent mails to the accounts of any criminals or could make calls to any so-called terrorist’s mobile number and later they could submit these “solid evidences” before the court. These evidences often get easily accepted in those courts and those victimised will find it tough to prove their innocence. The report says that, this sought of tactics has been employed by the intelligence agencies since last twenty years.