Hindustan Times ST (Mumbai) - Live
Top court refuses to make charge sheets public
NEW DELHI: A charge sheet filed in a criminal case is not a “public document” and cannot be put in public domain for free access, the Supreme Court held on Friday, and added that doing so will violate rights of the victim, accused and even the probe agencies.
A bench of justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by journalist Saurav Das, who sought that all charge sheets or final reports should be uploaded on state websites as they are summary of police investigations in criminal cases.
“If all the charge sheets and relevant documents produced along with the charge sheets are put on the public domain or on the websites of the state governments, it will be contrary to the scheme of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and it may as such violate the rights of the accused as well as the victim and/or even the investigating agency,” the bench said.
The petitioner relied on a 2016 decision of the Supreme Court that directed police to upload the first information reports (FIRs) within 24 hours of their registration. If FIRs that are unsubstantiated allegations could be made public, the petitioner argued, there was a greater need to disclose contents of a charge sheet, which is the investigation report.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioner, cited provisions of the CrPC, Evidence
Act and the Right to Information Act to buttress the point that uploading charge sheets on state website will induce transparency in criminal justice system.
However, the bench disagreed with the petitioner on every count. It said, “On conjoint reading of Sections 173 and 207 of CrPC, the investigating agency is required to furnish the copies of the final report (charge sheet) along with the relevant documents to be relied upon by the prosecution to the accused and to none others.”
It also dealt with Section 74 of the Evidence Act, which defines ‘public documents’. “Copy of the charge sheet along with the necessary documents cannot be said to be public documents within the definition of ‘Public Documents’ as per Section 74 of the Evidence Act...reliance placed upon Section 74 and 76 of Evidence Act is absolutely misplaced,” the bench said.
It also considered the 2016 decision of the top court. “The directions issued by this court (in Youth Bar Association case) are in favour of the accused, which cannot be stretched to the public at large so far as the charge sheets are concerned,” it said. “Putting the FIR on the website cannot be equated with putting charge sheets... on the public domain.”