CBI not a caged parrot but can't question policy decisions: FM

Says CBI and CAG have overstepped their limits

A day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asked the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to draw the line between policy-making and policing, Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Tuesday said the agency should not question government policies and that it and the Comptroller & Auditor General (CAG) had gone beyond their mandate.

“I would caution investigating agencies to respect the line that divides policy-making and policing. Unfortunately, there are a number of cases where investigating agencies, and other authorities like the CAG, have overstepped their limits and attempted to convert bona fide executive decisions into either crimes or abuse of authority,” the finance minister said at a CBI conference in New Delhi.  He also said notions about the CBI being a “caged parrot”and working in favour of the United Progressive Alliance were baseless.

Earlier this year, the Supreme Court had called CBI a “caged parrot speaking in its master’s voice”. The remarks had come in connection with the coal block allocation scam and the government’s interference in the probe by the investigating agency.

“There are several myths about the CBI, ranging from the celebrated epithet ‘caged bird’ to the abusive nomenclature ‘Congress Bureau of Investigation’. None of the descriptions are correct or even well-meaning. Some myths are carefully fostered and propagated in order to serve an immediate or narrow self-interest. In a lighter vein, I may say that sometimes the CBI itself pretends to be a ‘helpless victim’ when it pleads for more power and greater autonomy,” he said.

In the backdrop of the Gauhati High Court order, which had recently called the CBI “unconstitutional”, and was later stayed by the Supreme Court, Chidambaram said it was time to start rethinking the legal foundations of the agency so as to achieve clarity on objectives, powers and accountability.

On the role of public servants in financial crimes, he said the CBI must confine itself to the question whether there has been a violation of laid down rules of conduct.

“It is not the business of the investigating agency to lay down a rule of conduct nor is it the business of the investigating agency to presume a rule of conduct. Even where a rule has been prescribed, if there is a policy behind that rule, it is not the business of the investigating agency to question the wisdom of the policy or to suggest a different policy that would be better in its view,” Chidambaram said.

The finance minster said as long as there were reasons given in support of a decision, the CBI should not jump to the conclusion that it amounts to a crime.

The CAG had recently questioned the policies adapted by the government in the allocation of spectrum and coal block allocations — both the issues are being probed by the CBI.

Chidambaram also said the CBI must recruit bankers, accountants, lawyers, insurers, fund managers and security experts, train them in substantive and procedural laws, and turn them into first rate investigators.

He said there was a need to redesign investigating agencies with clearly defined objectives, precisely enumerated powers and carefully designed accountability mechanisms.