197 ex-bureaucrats, judges back PM Modi

New Delhi, April 30

Days after former bureaucrats wrote to PM Narendra Modi to stop the “politics of hate”, 197 former civil servants and retired judges penned a missive on Saturday backing the PM and accusing their colleagues of selective outrage.

While the previous letter critical of the PM came from 108 signatories of the ‘Constitutional Conduct Group’ (CCG), Saturday’s letter came from ‘Concerned Citizens’ featuring eight former judges, 97 ex-civil servants and 92 ex-armed forces personnel.

The latest letter read: “We do not believe that the open letter to the PM by the Constitutional Conduct Group had sincere motivations.” It said the CCG’s letter was an act of frustration against public opinion which was “solidly behind Modi”.

Among signatories to the letter are Sikkim High Court’s ex-chief justice Permod Kohli, ex-foreign secretaries Kanwal Sibal and Shashank, former RAW chief Sanjeev Tripathi and former J&K DGP SP Vaid.

“…They are actually fuelling the politics of hate they seek to combat by attempting to engineer hate against the government with their patent prejudices and false portrayals… That these open letters repeat the same language, have the same tenor and use biased terms with clear ideological moorings speaks for itself,” today’s letter said, questioning the silence of the CCG on post-poll violence in Bengal.