In May 2013, the Supreme Court, while hearing on a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) report on the coal scam, called it a ”caged parrot speaking in its master’s voice”. The only thing that has changed is the master, from Congress-led UPA to the BJP now.
For decades, the CBI has been used primarily as a political tool. In most cases, it was the hammer with which the Union governments nailed satraps.
Faced with the all-round demand for a CBI inquiry into the ”unnatural” death of firebrand IAS official, D K Ravi, the defiant chief minister Siddaramaiah should probably take a leaf from none other than Prime Minister Narendra Modi. As Gujarat CM on June 24, 2013, Modi pointed out, ”CBI has become the Congress Bureau of Investigation. The nation has lost faith in the CBI. I would like to tell the Centre: do not show us the fear of CBI. Do not spread lies to defame Gujarat.”
The fortunes of Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh ebbed and soared with the CBI’s whims on the Taj Corridor case and the disproportionate assets case against her. This depended on how important her support was to the government to the Centre at that point of time. CBI took only two days after the DMK broke its nine-year-long relationship with the Congress to raid MK Stalin’s residence in 2013. From Mulayalam Singh Yadav to Shibu Soren to Jayalalithaa to the most recent regional leader to challenge the Centre — Jagan Mohan Reddy, all of them had the ‘caged parrot’ set upon them, some, we daresay, deservedly. It seems every case that becomes a talking point, whipped up especially by a crass electronic media, and where the aam janta, the troll janata and the social media-generated citizen journalist take an interest, should be given to the central agency for an ”unbiased” and ”fair” investigation. Really?
In fact, D K Ravi’s parents, by their own admission, didn’t know even what IAS meant. That they could independently debate and decide on the merits of the CBI over the CID without outside influence is hard to fathom.
The street drama is screaming for a CBI inquiry, but is the state government bound to bend down to every pressure? If the state cannot take pride in its own agencies, is it not better to hand over the investigation to Scotland Yard or NYPD rather than the CBI or Shivaji Satam’s CID?
