Journalists not exempted from disclosing sources if it helps criminal probe, says Delhi court
Judiciary

Journalists not exempted from disclosing sources if it helps criminal probe, says Delhi court

Court also points out a probe agency can ask people to mandatorily join an investigation, if it feels they might have information pertaining to the case.

   
Representational image for the judiciary | Photo: Commons

Representational image | Photo: Commons

New Delhi: There is no legal exemption available to journalists from disclosing their sources to an investigating agency, a Delhi court observed Tuesday.

Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Anjani Mahajan observed, “There is no statutory exemption in India to journalists from disclosing their sources to investigating agencies, more so where such disclosure is necessary for the purpose of aiding and assisting in investigation of a criminal case.”

The judge asserted that “the investigating agency can always bring to the notice of the concerned journalists the requirement of disclosure of the source being essential and vital to the investigation proceedings”.

The court also pointed out that the agency can ask people to mandatorily join an investigation, if it feels such people might have information pertaining to the case under probe. It asserted that “public persons are under a legal duty to so join the investigation”.

The court made the observations while rejecting a closure report filed by the CBI in the “fake CBI report case”, pertaining to news reports publishing a fabricated CBI note in cases related to allegations of disproportionate assets against former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family members.

The fake CBI report was aired after the Supreme Court, in March 2007, directed the agency to conduct a preliminary inquiry into the assets that Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family members had acquired.

The CBI conducted the enquiry between March 2007 and October 2007, and had filed two status reports in sealed covers before the Supreme Court. The case was to come up for final hearing on 9 February 2009.

However, a day before this final hearing, The Times of India published a news article with the title “CBI may admit Mulayam was framed — DIG’s internal note says agency had not verified in PIL”. The same news was also aired on Star News and CNN-IBN.

The review note aired and published by news organisations was allegedly fabricated. An FIR was then filed on 16 March 2009, against unknown persons for preparing a fake and fabricated report to tarnish the reputation of the CBI. As per forensics’ opinion — as noted in the court order — the signature of CBI Deputy Inspector General of Police Tilottama Verma “had been lifted from the original note-sheet and compressed and reproduced on the alleged 17 pages review note”.


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‘Fully equipped under IPC & CrPC’

However, the CBI had now filed a final closure and “untrace” reports in the case, contending that the documents used by the news channels were forged but it could not find who had forged the documents because the news channels did not disclose their source. It asserted that there wasn’t sufficient material or evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy.

In its order, the court felt the closure report “shows that the CBI has not chosen to take the investigation to its logical conclusion”. It asserted that the investigating agency should not have halted its entire investigation, merely because the concerned journalists refused to reveal their sources.

The court asserted that the CBI is well within its power to issue notices under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), and direct journalists and news agencies to provide the required information. Section 91 allows the court or any police officer to demand production of any document or other things that they may feel were necessary for an investigation. It then said that further enquiry needed to be conducted from the concerned journalists on their sources from whom they received the forged documents.

“The investigating agency is fully equipped under the IPC and CrPC to require the public persons to mandatorily join in an investigation where the investigating agency is of the opinion that such public persons are privy to any facts or circumstances pertaining to the case under investigation and public persons are under a legal duty to so join the investigation,” it explained.

“Further, based on such information, additional clues regarding the identities of the culprits who entered into the alleged criminal conspiracy, prepared and fraudulently and knowingly used as genuine the forged document by providing it to the media/ getting it published/aired, could be found and probed,” the court ordered.

The court further noted that while journalists Deepak Chaurasia, Bhupinder Chaubey and Manoj Mitta were examined, only Chaubey’s statement is on record and only he has been listed as a witness in the CBI’s first final report. The court, however, felt that this needed a relook by the CBI.

‘Totally silent’

The order also noted that the two allegedly forged status reports contained several paragraphs lifted from the undated CBI status report which was kept in a sealed cover for the Supreme Court. It, however, said the CBI’s final report was “totally silent on the aspect of investigation, if at all any conducted, as to how the official document i.e. the undated status report of the CBI which was kept in sealed cover got leaked a day before it was to be filed before the Hon’ble Apex Court, from the office of CBI, ultimately reaching the media”.

It also noted that the final report does not disclose any investigation on “how the forger could have gained access to the original note-sheet of Smt. Tilotama Varma from which the signatures had been lifted, compressed and reproduced on the alleged forged document as per opinion of the CFSL”.

The court, therefore, rejected the “untrace” report, and directed the CBI to carry on further investigation in the case.

“Thus, further investigation is also required to be carried out by the CBI on the modus operandi adopted by the culprits for gaining access to/obtaining the official documents including probing involvement of any insider in the acts alleged and preparing the alleged forged 17 pages review note,” it ordered.

The CBI has been given time till 24 March for filing a supplementary report in the case.


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