Saket Gokhale misquotes RTI reply to assert no bomb factories in WB

The ministry of dwelling affairs has mentioned that Congress supporter and so-called RTI activist Saket Gokhale misquoted replies to his RTI queries with an ulterior motive and malicious intent. The ministry mentioned that Gokhale makes use of reply to a distinct RTI question to assert that the ministry has no info on bomb factories in West Bengal. MHA issued the assertion after a number of media homes revealed stories primarily based on Gokhale’s claims.
Gokhale had filed an RTI question to search out whether or not the claims made by Home Minister Amit Shah was true or not. In a TV interview in October 2020, Amit Shah had mentioned that there re “bomb-making factories in every district” in West Bengal. Gokhale had filed a RTI question in October 2020 looking for particulars of those unlawful bomb-making factories from the house ministry. He furnished 4 questions within the question, the place he wished a district smart record of the factories, whether or not official briefing on such factories got to the union dwelling ministry, whether or not the house minister’s assertion was primarily based on official inputs, and whether or not a listing of such bomb making factories has been shared with the West Bengal authorities.
Breaking:In Oct, Home Minister @AmitShah gave an interview to CNN News18 the place he claimed “there are bomb-making factories in every district of West Bengal”.So, I filed a 4-point RTI looking for the supply of Home Minister’s feedback. And that is the place it will get stunning.(1/5) pic.twitter.com/fxz0VEzh9u— Saket Gokhale (@SaketGokhale) March 9, 2021
On ninth March, Saket Gokhale tweeted that he has obtained the reply for his RTI utility, and claimed that the MHA has mentioned that they don’t have the data he had sought. He additionally posted a screenshot of the reply, which mentioned that the ministry does have the data on the purpose numbers 1 to three within the RTI question. The MHA reply additionally states that ‘police’ and ‘police order’ are state topics, and the state police is the primary responder in any prison/terrorist exercise. Therefore, the ministry had written that Gokhale can search the data from states/union territories.
I’d requested for (1) a listing of the bomb making factories in Bengal referred to by Amit Shah(2) Whether MHA had briefed Shah about this(3) Whether Shah’s remarks had been primarily based on official informationThe Home Ministry’s reply is NO. They declare they have no such data.(2/5) pic.twitter.com/6AqPNbhQ9W— Saket Gokhale (@SaketGokhale) March 9, 2021
Saket Gokhale additionally claimed that whereas he had requested 4 questions, MHA referred to solely three. Therefore, he concluded that no bomb factories exist in West Bengal as he had requested whether or not MHA had shared the record of factories with the WB authorities. He referred to as the union dwelling minister a liar, claiming that there are not any bomb factories in West Bengal and Amit Shah was giving false info.
However, now the Home Ministry has mentioned that it’s Saket Gokhale who’s mendacity, as he’s utilizing the MHA response to a distinct RTI question to color the house minister as liar. They have mentioned that Saket Gokhale had filed an RTI utility in January, which had three questions looking for particulars of involvement of Khalistani organizations in farmer’s protest. The MHA reply that Gokhale posted on ninth March was for this RTI question, and never for the West Bengal bomb factories.

There have been some stories within the media quoting tweets of Shri Saket Gokhale about an RTI reply by MHA. Shri Gokhale has misrepresented the information whereas tweeting with a malicious intention. pic.twitter.com/KfTAWNxLdD— Spokesperson, Ministry of Home Affairs (@PIBHomeAffairs) March 11, 2021
Home ministry mentioned that they’d obtained two on-line RTI functions from Gokhale on the Khalistani difficulty, one instantly and the opposite by means of Department of authorized affairs, they usually had replied to this question on third March. The dwelling ministry additionally mentioned that Saket Gokhale intentionally masked the reference numbers of his queries, in order that he can hyperlink the question to his West Bengal query.
MHA says that its reply clearly states the reference numbers of the RTI functions, MHOME/R/T/21/00110 and MHOME/R/E/21/00149 and their date 12 January 2021, making it clear that they had been replying to the question looking for particulars of Khalistanis concerned in farmer protests. However, Gokhale masked the reference quantity from the RTI reply when he posted the identical on Twitter.
The minister additional knowledgeable that they haven’t obtained the question dated 18th October, 2020 concerning the bomb factories, and has not replied to the identical.
The Home Ministry has mentioned that Gokhale did this with an ulterior motive and malicious intent. They mentioned that he linked the reply to a distinct question with malicious intent of deceptive public and spreading lies and canard on social media platform.
Even although Saket Gokhale redacted the reference quantity within the RTI reply, it nonetheless reveals that MHA had obtained the RTI question on seventeenth February. Therefore, is secure to imagine that they had been responding to a question filed not too long ago. Moreover, the reply cited three queries, whereas Saket’s utility on bomb factories had 4 questions. MHA clarification states that his question on Khalistanis had three particular questions, and thus the reply mentions 3 questions.
Gokhale’s declare that MHA didn’t reply the fourth query as a result of there are not any bomb factories in West Bengal doesn’t make sense in any respect. Because his different questions additionally consult with bomb factories solely.
The full assertion issued by the house ministry is given beneath:
There have been some stories within the media quoting tweets of Shri Saket Gokhale about an RTI reply by MHA. Shri Gokhale has misrepresented the information whereas tweeting with a malicious intention. The reality of the matter is that CPIO CTCR Division, MHA obtained two on-line RTI functions from Shri Gokhale; vide HOME/R/T/21/00110 and HOME/R/E/21/00149 dated twelfth Jan 2021, one in MHA and different one from Department of Legal affairs respectively. Shri Gokhale, vide each the above talked about functions had requested for info on three particular factors associated inter-alia to the involvement of Khalistani organizations in farmer’s protest. The CPIO, MHA, replied to him on third March 2021, vide letter no 17011/01/2020/CT-1. Shri Gokhale by means of his tweets, dated ninth March 2021, misquoted the reply of the CPIO. To buttress his declare, Shri Gokhale linked the copy of reply of CPIO with a distinct utility, purportedly made on 18th October 2020 on one other topic altogether which was neither obtained by this specific CPIO, MHA nor replied by him. In the reply CPIO MHA, had clearly talked about the reference numbers MHOME/R/T/21/00110 &MHOME/R/E/21/00149 and date of RTI utility (twelfth Jan 2021), in order that there remained little doubt and ambiguity concerning the RTI utility being replied. With an ulterior motive & malicious intent Sh Gokhale in his tweets, intentionally obliterated reference no. of RTI reply, whereas linking this reply together with his earlier utility dt. 18/10/20 with malicious intent of deceptive public & unfold lies & canard on social media platform
While the Congress supporter is working exhausting to in some way show that there in bomb factories in West Bengal dominated by TMC, a celebration his Congress is contesting within the meeting elections, no RTI query is required to see what’s open within the air. Devastating explosions have taken locations in a number of unlawful bomb factories in West Bengal. Crude bombs are recovered from varied individuals and social gathering employees, and even from political social gathering workplaces very repeatedly. Crude bombs have additionally been utilized in political violence within the state. Therefore, what Amit Shah mentioned was true, there are bomb factories in West Bengal.