New Delhi: Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee today (Feb 28, 2004) denied allegations by Karnataka's ruling Congress party that the Centre was tapping the telephones of Chief Minister S M Krishna and 60 other leaders in the State.

"Our Government does not do phone tapping," he said when referred to the allegation on the sidelines of a function to release the Devnagri transcription of 'Tarjumanul' (translated version of) Quran authored by the country's first Education Minister Maulana Abul Kalam Azad.

Karnataka's former Chief Minister Veerappa Moily, who heads the Congress' manifesto committee, and the party's State unit spokesman V S Ugrapppa alleged at a press conference in Bangalore yesterday that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders have resorted to telephone tapping to keep a watch on the poll strategies of the party.