Enough guidelines in place on phone tapping, no need for more: HC

The Delhi High Court Monday said there were enough guidelines in place with regard to tracing, tapping and surveillance of phone calls and dismissed a plea seeking directions to the Centre to frame rules on the issue.

A bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice C Hari Shankar said the rules and guidelines for tapping and surveillance of phones were already provided under the Indian Telegraph Act.

"In view of the already existing guidelines and rules, we see no reason to give further guidance to Respondent 1 (Centre) on tapping of phone calls," the court said, dismissing the petition of Sarthak Chaturvedi, an advocate, who wanted comprehensive norms on tracing and surveillance of phones.

The bench also rejected his plea for constituting a Special Investigative Team (SIT) to look into his allegations that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had tapped the phones of various government officials, including National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval.

The bench said there was no need to setup an SIT as government phone calls are tapped only in certain situations that are in the interest of the sovereignty and integrity of India, and that too after taking approval of high ranking officers.

The CBI had earlier denied Chaturvedi's allegation that it had illegally tapped the phones of Doval and the agency's then special director Rakesh Asthana.

Chaturvedi had alleged in his plea that the illegal act of "abuse of power" was committed by some public servants working in the agency "for their ulterior motive".

However, the CBI had denied the allegations and said it was "false and incorrect".

The agency had said in its response that interception of phone calls and technical surveillance are undertaken by it after following the procedure established by the law.

The petition had claimed that a special unit of the CBI, which handles phone-tapping and technical surveillance, was aware of the communications between the NSA and Asthana during the latter's feud with former CBI director Alok Verma.

Verma was removed by a high-level panel headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 10.

Chaturvedi's petition had said the issue of tapping of phones was revealed in an application filed in the Supreme Court by CBI DIG Manish Sinha, who was investigating an FIR registered against Asthana.

It had added that Sinha's application, which disclosed several crucial facts of an ongoing investigation and "commission of cognisable offence of abuse of powers by public servants", was published on a news website.