The Hindu : National : Supreme Court to hear U.P. petition on February 17

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Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006

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National

Supreme Court to hear U.P. petition on February 17

Legal Correspondent

It challenges Delhi High Court's jurisdiction in the telephone tapping case

New Delhi: The Supreme Court will hear on February 17 special leave petitions filed by the Uttar Pradesh government challenging the territorial jurisdiction of the Delhi High Court in entertaining petitions in the Amar Singh telephone tapping case and issuing contempt notice to the Special Task Force.

A three-Judge Bench comprising Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, Justice G.P. Mathur and Justice R.V. Raveendran fixed the date of hearing during `mention' time on Tuesday. The State said the special leave petitions were the result of a controversy over the High Court quashing the First Information Report registered by the government on a complaint from a resident of Noida alleging illegal tapping of personal and intimate conversation he had with Amar Singh, Member of Parliament and General Secretary of the Samajwadi Party.

The petitions alleged that the Uttar Pradesh police suspected that the actual culprits were the complainants in Delhi who were out to shield the real accused and prevent the detection of the crime. The State pointed out that the High Court by an interim order on January 20 restrained the government from interfering with the investigation of the complaint registered by the Delhi police. And the High Court later issued contempt notice for violating the interim orders.

The SLPs raised the legal issue whether such a course adopted by the Delhi police was not a clear act of abuse of the due process of law. The petitioner pointed out that the High Court had only restrained the Uttar Pradesh police from interfering in the investigation of the FIR registered by the Delhi police and had not injuncted the UP police from conducting investigation in relation to the FIR registered by the Noida police. Hence there was no contempt of the Delhi High Court order, the petitioner said and prayed for quashing the impugned orders and an interim stay of their operation.

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