Fascist clouds loom over land: Tewari

Attacking the BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi without naming him, Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari said Saturday "dark clouds of fascism" and "a great evil stalks" the land while referring to the expose about alleged state-sponsored stalking in Gujarat involving former minister Amit Shah.

"As we go about upholding constitutional values and go about our chores, dark clouds of fascism loom ominously over the horizon, a great evil stalks our land," he said at a seminar on the role of media in serving public interest.

"The first casualty of the society would be the constriction of liberal space, curtailment of creativity and circumscribing the right to challenge convention and think off the beaten path."

"If the alleged expose about state-sponsored stalking is correct, I would be worried, not as a woman but as a civil libertarian about the Orwellian state that some esteemed gentlemen aim to create," he said.

He was referring to three key wings of Gujarat Police misusing their powers to stalk an unmarried young woman from Bangalore in 2009 under orders from then minister of state for home Amit Shah who did it for his "saheb", say investigative websites Cobrapost and Gulail.

"The entire surveillance-cum-phone interception operation by the State Intelligence Bureau, the Crime Branch and the Anti-Terrorist Squad was mounted in August 2009 on oral orders, without any valid legal authorisation, and was meant only to serve the interests of someone whom the then minister of state for home, Amit Shah, addressed as 'saheb,'" the report says.