BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis has said the Maharashtra government did not avail of the services of the private Israeli firm NSO, which licenses its military-grade Pegasus spyware to governments for tracking terrorists and criminals, as long as he was the state chief minister.

Fadnavis, Maharashtra chief minister during 2014-19, and now Opposition leader in the state Assembly was speaking to reporters following claims that the Pegasus software, that can infect phones without a click, was used in attempted and successful hacks of smartphones belonging to journalists, human rights activists and business executives in India and many other countries.