The Supreme Court took the Union government to task on Friday, ordering the Centre to provide a proper response to a petition by academicians, which asked it to frame guidelines for preserving contents of digital devices in case they are seized by investigating agencies.
“It is not enough for the Centre to say that the petition is not maintainable,” a bench of justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh told Additional Solicitor General S V Raju, who was appearing for the Centre.
Observing that the Centre should look at international practices, the bench also pointed out that the devices seized could have personal contents of people, which need to be protected.
Raju agreed to re-examine the matter, as the top court expressed displeasure with the Centre’s response.
The petitioners in the matter claimed that the manuals of the Central Bureau of Investigation or the National Investigation Agency do not contain any procedure about preserving contents of digital devices. According to the petition, the lack of proper procedure resulted in damage and loss of the academicians’ research work, if they are subjected to investigation.
The petitioners in the matter were former Jawaharlal Nehru University professor Ram Ramaswamy, Sujata Patel who is with the Savitribai Phule Pune University, Madhava Prasad who teaches cultural studies at the English and Foreign Languages University, Mukul Kesavan who is a professor of modern Indian history at Jamia Millia Islamia, and theoretical ecological economist Deepak Malghan.
Their plea contended that the investigating agencies seized the academicians’ devices in several cases in the past, leading to the loss or premature exposure of their work, because the academic community stored their research and writings on the electronic device. And in the future, too, in the event of seizure of electronic devices the threat of loss or premature exposure of their academic or literary work is considerable, their petition stated.
(Published 05 August 2022, 17:28 IST)
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