: The Delhi High Court on Monday asked the CBI to provide photocopies of the documents seized from the office of the Delhi government’s Principal Secretary Rajendra Kumar in connection with a corruption case last month.
Justice P.S. Teji said the court wants to examine whether the papers were relevant and can be retained by the probe agency for investigating the alleged charges against Mr. Kumar.
Justice Teji was hearing a revision petition challenging a lower court order directing the CBI to return the documents, in original, to the Delhi government as they are not relevant to the probe.
Directing the Central Bureau of Investigation to supply photocopies of the documents in two days, the Court posted the matter for further hearing on January 29.
In its petition, the CBI said that the Special CBI Judge failed to appreciate that the Delhi government had already obtained photocopies of the documents and, thus, the order of returning the documents was wholly misconceived. The Judge also failed to appreciate that the right of investigation was its inherent right, which could not be curtailed by passing such orders, the petition further said.
The Delhi government in its reply to the CBI plea has urged the Court to dismiss it, saying “that the CBI has filed a frivolous, baseless, vexatious and merit-less petition with obtuse motives”.
A Special court for CBI cases on January 20 had directed the investigating agency to return these documents to the Delhi government.
The government had sought back these documents from CBI, arguing that they were unrelated to and unnecessary for the investigation of the case against the senior officer and others.
