BJP govt using central agencies to harass opposition leaders: Harish Rawat

Haridwar, Mar 30 (PTI) Senior Congress leader and former chief minister Harish Rawat on Saturday accused the BJP of using central agencies like the CBI, ED, I-T department and the NIA to harass opposition leaders and eliminate any challenge from them in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

Democracy and constitutional institutions are in danger under BJP rule in the country and people want change, he said.

"The ruling party first filled its own coffers in the name of electoral bonds and then seized the accounts of the Congress and whatever donations it had received to paralyse the party. Now income tax notices are being issued," Rawat said.

"Centre's atrocities on opposition parties are increasing. It is trying to stop the opposition in the elections by using agencies like the CBI, ED, Income Tax Department and NIA," Rawat who was here to inaugurate the election office of his son and the party's Lok Sabha candidate from Haridwar Virender Rawat told reporters.

Former PCC president and Pauri Garhwal candidate Ganesh Godiyal was served notices by the I-T department recently asking him to appear in person before its office in Thane (Maharashtra).

Rawat who has been campaigning for his son in the constituency claimed voters are increasingly leaning towards the Congress.

"Whenever the party in power commits excesses, it is punished by the people of the country. They remove it from power and bring about a change," he said.

On the broad daylight murder of dera kar sevak chief of Nanakmatta gurudwara, Baba Tarsem Singh, he said it shows the total collapse of the law and order situation in Uttarakhand.

"The well-planned manner in which the murder was committed suggests there was a conspiracy behind it, Rawat said.

Rawat also termed gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansari's death as suspicious. "It would be difficult for the government to prove that it was a natural death," he said.

According to a hospital source, the post-mortem on Ansari confirmed that he died of cardiac arrest. However, a magisterial inquiry was ordered as opposition parties raised questions over Ansari's death, amid allegations by his family that he died due to "slow poisoning" in Banda jail. PTI COR ALM ALM SKY SKY