Rao’s appointment as interim CBI chief not illegal or unauthorised: SC

NEWDELHI:THE Supreme Court dismissed on Tuesday a joint public interest litigation by NGO Common Cause and RTI Activist Anjali Bharadwaj, questioning the appointment of CBI’S former interim director, M Nageswara Rao. A bench of justices Arun Mishra and Navin Sinha said there was no illegality in Rao’s appointment since a high-powered selection committee (HPSC) passed a resolution authorising the appointment in keeping with the law.

“It is apparent from the decision of the committee under Section 4A that the government was authorised to post a suitable officer as interim director due to the vacancy caused by shifting of Alok Verma. Thus, the submission raised in the petition on behalf of the petitioners that the HPSC has not authorised the appointment of interim director is totally misconceived and petitioners have failed to verify the aforesaid facts and the petition has been filed in undue haste .... ,” read the judgement, authored by Justice Mishra. In its order the court did not deal with a contempt application filed against petitioner’s advocate, Prashant Bhushan. Attorney General KK Venugopal moved a contempt plea against Bhushan for a tweet in which he insinuated that the top law officer misled the court by saying that Rao’s appointment was approved by the selection panel. The PIL wanted the top court to quash the January 10 order appointing Rao as the CBI interim director. A further prayer was made to issue appropriate direction to the Union of India to ensure that all records of deliberations and rational criteria of shortlisting and selection of the director, CBI be properly recorded and made available to citizens under the RTI.

The court, however, did not consider this. NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court will hear from March 26 review pleas challenging its 2018 judgment that tweaked provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and petitions challenging the government’s rollback of these changes through an amendment.

In March last year, the court banned automatic arrests and registration of cases under the law and said there was no absolute bar against the grant of anticipatory bail in cases of atrocities against SC and ST communities.

The verdict was criticised by experts and political parties for making the socially disadvantaged sections vulnerable and led to protests in some parts of the country.

The government then rolled back these provisions through an amendment to the law. The changes restored the power of police to carry out immediate arrests in cases of atrocities and denial of anticipatory bail.

A bench of Justices U U Lalit and Indu Malhotra said it would hold the hearings for three consecutive days from March 26 and pass its verdict thereafter.

The date was fixed after the bench ascertained the views of attorney general K K Venugopal, who appeared for the Centre and other senior lawyers like Indira Jaising appearing for the petitioners.

The court earlier agreed to hear the Centre’s review against its order, but it declined to stay the operation of the judgement, prompting the government to bring in the amendment.

Last April, nine people were killed in violence during a bandh called against the dilution of the SC/ST Act in states like Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab, and Bihar. Some SC and ST members of Parliament from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party even wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging the Centre to intervene.

The court’s view was that the provisions of the law are often misused.