The Supreme Court heard the case of the Pegasus snooping row today, which made headlines earlier this year. In the hearing, the apex court allowed the formation of an inquiry panel for further probe into the matter, as per the requests made by the petitioners.
The Supreme Court has further appointed a three-member committee to lead the inquiry in this case. The committee will be headed by RV Raveendran, a former Supreme Court Judge. Other members of the panel will be Alok Joshi and Sandeep Oberoi.
The apex court said that the committee has been formed to probe the falsity and discover the truth in Pegasus row and that the Right to Privacy violation, in this case, needs to be examined. There is a serious concern of foreign agency involvement by surveilling Indians, the Supreme Court said.
During the hearing, the Supreme Court said, “We issued notice to the government. We gave ample opportunity to the government to give details of all action taken by it. But despite repeated chances, they gave limited affidavit that does not give clarity. If they had clarified they would have reduced the burden on us. But that does not mean state gets a free pass every time national security is raised.”
The court further commented that a “vague denial from the government” is not sufficient in this case. The formation of the three-member committee will lead to a thorough probe in the matter, as per the Supreme Court. The court will then review the data put forward by this committee in eight weeks.
After the Pegasus row gathered momentum, the Centre had refused to file an affidavit in the matter and had refused to comment on whether they used the software or not, citing national security issues. It had further ordered to form an independent committee to probe the matter under the supervision of the Supreme Court.
According to media reports, several notable people in India were under the lens of the Pegasus software, including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, poll strategist Prashant Kishor, two serving Union Ministers, an ex-Election Commissioner, and over 40 journalists. None of these names have been confirmed yet by any official source.
