Supreme Court asks Zee News editors for voice samples

The Supreme Court has directed Zee News editors Sudhir Chaudhary and Samir Ahluwalia to give the voice samples in the alleged extortion case registered by the police based on a complaint by Rajiv Bhadauria of Jindal Steel Company.

A three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice T.S. Thakur and Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and D.Y. Chandrachud, however, modified the conditions imposed by the Delhi high court and permitted the Investigating officer to take voce samples of a prepared text as approved by the court.

The Zee News editors approached the Supreme Court against the order dismissing an application filed by them for monitoring the investigation and for a direction to the investigating officer to provide material for the purpose of a voice sample “which does not contain any inculpatory statement” in the presence of a judicial magistrate.

The allegation in the FIR is that the appellants demanded a sum of money to refrain from telecasting programmes on a television channel pertaining to the alleged involvement of a corporate entity in a wrongful activity pertaining to the allocation of coal blocks. Disposing of the appeal, the Supreme Court bench observed that since the appellants expressly consented to a voice sample being drawn, the only issue before the Supreme Court is to ensure that the underlying process for drawing the voice samples is fair and reasonable.

Hence, we do not find substance in the submission that the text which is to be read by the Appellants in the course of drawing their voice samples should contain no part of the inculpatory words which are a part of the disputed conversation.