HC rules phone tapping cannot be used in regular crime detection
It can be resorted to only in a public emergency or in the interest of public safety, which are not secretive conditions or situations, Justice N Anand Venkatesh stated.
Either of the situations would be apparent to a reasonable person. Covert surveillance of the type conducted in this case cannot fall within the aforesaid two situations contemplated under Section 5(2) of the Indian Telegraph Act, he added. The court made the observations on a plea moved by P Kishore, managing director of Everonn Education Limited, seeking to quash a 2011 order issued by the CBI to intercept his telegraphic conversations and messages.
Based on the phone tapping, the CBI arrested Kishore and Andasu Ravindar, who had accepted a bribe of 50 lakh from him to conceal that tax was payable on 116 crore. Opposing the plea, the CBI contended that the interception was necessary to prevent and investigate corruption, which also constitutes a threat to public safety.
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Refusing to concur, the court said that even as per the affidavit of the CBI, the intercepted conversations were not placed before the review committee in terms of Rule 419-A of the Rules.
Thus, the govt cannot feign ignorance of the law when it purportedly issued the tapping order. The court added that the effect of a breach of public order would involve a wide spectrum of the public and does not involve a covert operation hatched and carried out in secrecy, such as the case on hand.
The CBI, however, requested the court to expand the scope of Section 5(2) of the act to accommodate cases of this nature. To this, the court said, "This court is unable to accept this submission since the boundaries for invasion of a fundamental right through the medium of enacted law is a function of the legislature and not the court."
The CBI further argued that even assuming that the tapping order was without jurisdiction, the evidence so collected is admissible since it is a well-settled proposition of law that even illegally collected evidence is admissible provided it is relevant. "An unconstitutional order is void under Article 13 of the Constitution and no rights or liabilities can flow from it," the court held. The court then allowed the plea and quashed the CBI order permitting the tapping of the petitioner's phone.
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