SC grants interim protection to former SIB chief in phone tapping case

The Supreme Court on Thursday granted interim protection from coercive action to former chief of Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) in Telangana T Prabhakar Rao, an accused in the phone-tapping case.

A bench comprising Justices B V Nagarathna and Satish Chandra Sharma directed Rao to appear before the investigation officer, and said his passport be made available to him.

Rao, the key accused in the phone-tapping case, is suspected to be in the US. A Red Corner Notice was issued against him and his passport was revoked, a police official said earlier.

The top court also directed Rao to give an undertaking that he would return to India within three days after the receipt of his passport. 

 

During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and senior advocate Sidharth Luthra vehemently opposed the plea filed by Rao seeking anticipatory bail.

The matter is posted for hearing on August 5.

Rao has moved the top court challenging an order of the Telangana High Court which dismissed his plea seeking anticipatory bail.

On May 22, a Hyderabad court has issued a proclamation order against Rao in the phone-tapping case.

According to the order, Rao may be declared a "proclaimed offender" if he does not appear before the court by June 20.

If a person is declared a proclaimed offender, the court can order attachment of properties of the accused. 

 

A suspended DSP of SIB was among four police officials who were arrested by Hyderabad Police since March 2024, for allegedly erasing the intelligence information from various electronic gadgets as well as for alleged phone-tapping during the previous BRS regime. They were subsequently granted bail.

The accused are part of the alleged conspiracy in which they "misused" the resources of SIB for political purposes by putting citizens from different walks of life under surveillance, police had said.

Those named as accused in the case along with others had allegedly developed profiles of several persons unauthorisedly and were accused of monitoring them clandestinely and illegally in SIB and using them in a partisan manner to favour a political party at the behest of some persons and also conspiracy in destroying the records to cause disappearance of evidence of their crimes, police earlier said.