Hamid Ansari invited Pakistani journalist spying for ISI, alleges BJP; former Vice-President calls it ‘litany of falsehood’

New Delhi: Former vice president M Hamid Ansari on Wednesday slammed BJP for alleging that he had passed sensitive information to a Pakistani journalist, and said "litany of falsehood" was being unleashed.

Congress media incharge Jairam Ramesh also condemned "insinuations and innuendos" by a spokesperson of the BJP against Congress President Sonia Gandhi and former vice president Hamid Ansari.

This came as the BJP slammed the Congress quoting a purported video by a Pakistani journalist where he claims he had visited India five times during UPA rule and shared sensitive information collected during his visits with his country's spy agency ISI.

As per reports, Pakistani journalist Nusrat Mirza has claimed in an interview that he had visited India several times allegedly on Ansari's invitation and that the former vice president had shared extremely sensitive and classified information with him.

BJP spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia, in a press conference on Wednesday said, "If Congress leaders Sonia and Rahul Gandhi besides the then vice president remain silent to the questions raised by the ruling party, it will amount to their admission to these sins."

"Yesterday and today, a litany of falsehood has been unleashed on me personally in a section of the media by the official spokesman of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that as the Vice President of India I had invited Pakistani journalist Nusrat Mirza. That I had met him in a conference in New Delhi on 'Terrorism'. That while as Ambassador to Iran, I had betrayed the national interest in matter for which allegations have been made by former official of a government agency," Ansari said.

"It is a known fact that invitations to foreign dignitaries by the Vice-President of India are on advice of the Government generally through the Ministry of External Affairs," he said.

Ansari said he had inaugurated the Conference on Terrorism on December 11, 2010. "As a normal practice the list of invitees would have been drawn by the organisers. I never met him".

He also said his work as the ambassador of Iran was in the knowledge of the present day government. "I am bound by the commitment to national security in such matters and refrain from commenting on them."

He said the government of India has all information and is the only authority to tell the truth.

"It is a matter of record that after my stint in Tehran, I was appointed as India's permanent representative to the United Nations in New York. My work there has been acknowledged at home and abroad," he said.

Jairam Ramesh meanwhile said in a statement, "Insinuations and innuendos by a spokesperson of the BJP against Smt. Sonia Gandhi, President of the Indian National Congress and Shri Hamid Ansari, former Vice-President of India, are to be condemned in the strongest possible language".

"The facts regarding the International Conference of Jurists on International Terrorism and Human Rights held on December 11, 2010 in New Delhi are already in the public domain. The insinuations and innuendos of the spokesperson of the BJP are character assassination of the worst form," Ramesh said.

"The levels that the Prime Minister and his party colleagues will stoop to debase public debate and spread their patented brand of lies is staggering. It reflects sickness of mind and lack of any form of integrity whatsoever," he added. (UNI)