CBI Under Administrative Control & Superintendence Of Union Govt : Supreme Court

The Bench of Justices BR Gavai and Sandeep Mehta made these observations while deciding the maintainability of the State of West Bengal's suit against the Union over registration of cases by the CBI despite the revocation of its general consent.

The genesis of the suit was that despite the revocation of the State's consent for the central agency under the DSPE Act, the CBI continued to register FIRs with respect to offences that took place within the State. It was in November 2018 when the State government withdrew its consent that allowed the CBI to conduct investigations of cases in West Bengal.

Per contra, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had argued that the suit against the Union is not maintainable as CBI is an independent legal person. Thus, it has a separate legal identity outside the Union of India. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the State, had, however, stressed that this issue will be to be decided on merits and not at this stage of the suit.

The Court, through this instant judgment, rejected the Union's argument. To support and strengthen its findings, the Court extensively referred to the relevant sections of the Act.

It observed that, as per section 4 of the DSPE Act, the Central Government is responsible for supervising DSPE, except in corruption cases. The court also noted that, as per Section 3 of the Act, the DSPE is entitled to investigate only those offences that are notified by the Central Government.

Taking a cue from this, the Court highlighted that though under Section 5 of the Act, powers of the DSPE can be extended to any State, the same is subject to the State Government's consent (Section 6 of the Act stipulates so).

“The statutory scheme makes it clear that, for extending such powers under Section 5 of the DSPE Act, it cannot be done without the consent of the Government of that State under Section 6 of the DSPE Act.”

With the above reasoning in place, the Court categorically rejected the argument that CBI cannot be equated to the Government of India. The Court said that the Union's argument “holds no water.”

“In our view, the CBI is an organ or a body which is established by and which is under the superintendence of the Government of India in view of the statutory scheme as enacted by the DSPE Act.,” the Court concluded.

Additionally, it may be noted that the Union had cited the precedent of Vineet Narain (1997). In this case, the central agency was placed under the supervision of the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC). The idea of Vineet Narain was to bring the Central Bureau of Investigation under the supervision of a separate statutory body and insulate it from the central government, Solicitor had submitted.

In this context, the Court acknowledged, CBI would always be entitled to investigate the offences independently. However, in the same breath, it also opined, that this would not “water down” the administrative control that the Central Government has over DSPE.

There is no doubt that the power of the superintendence of the Centre is administrative in nature and does not extend to the investigations carried out by the CBI, the Court stated.

"However, that would not water down the administrative control and superintendence of the DSPE that vests with the Central Government," the Court said.

Case Details: State of West Bengal v. Union of India | Original Suit No. 4 of 2021

Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 451

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