Pegasus Case : Supreme Court To Hear Tomorrow Plea Challenging West Bengal's Judicial Commission Probe

The Supreme Court will hear tomorrow (Friday) a plea challenging the Constitution of Enquiry Commission constituted by the State of West Bengal to investigate into the allegations pertaining to the Pegasus spyware scandal.

The matter has been listed after the counsel for the petitioner NGO "Global Village Foundation Charitable Trust" requested Chief Justice of India NV Ramana to urgently list the matter saying that the West Bengal Commission was going ahead with the probe even when the Supreme Court has constituted an independent expert committee to examine the Pegasus allegations.

The counsel mentioning the matter submitted that West Bengal had given an undertaking that the Committee will not function parallel with the Commission constituted by the Supreme Court. The Counsel urged the court to take up the matter on Friday or immediately after the winter break.

The Supreme Court had in August turned down the Trust's plea to stay the notification issued by West Bengal Government constituting an Enquiry Commission headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice Madan B Lokur to investigate the allegations pertaining to the Pegasus spyware scandal.

However, the bench took an oral undertaking from Senior Advocate Dr Abhishek Manu Singhvi on behalf of the State of West Bengal that the Commission will not function while the matter was under the Court's consideration.

On October 27, the Court had constituted an independent committee headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice RV Raveendran to probe into the Pegasus allegations. The bench turned down the plea of national security raised by the Union Government and observed that the petitioners' had made out a prima facie case.

The Pegasus controversy erupted on July 18 after The Wire and several other international publications published reports about the mobile numbers which were potential targets of the spyware service given by NSO company to various governments, including India. 40 Indian journalists, political leaders like Rahul Gandhi, election strategist Prashant Kishore, former ECI member Ashok Lavassa etc are reported to be in the list of targets, as per The Wire.

 Case Title: Global Village Foundation Charitable Trust vs Union of India & Ors