The Supreme Court on Monday decided to test the legality of the CBI stand that a person who does a sting operation on the sly to expose a ?corrupt? public official is liable to be charged with the offence of abetting corruption. Abetment of corruption draws a punishment of imprisonment of a maximum of five years and fine under the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act, 1988.
The premier agency?s view on sting operatives gains importance given there is no written law to regulate sting operations in the country.
A Division Bench of Justice Altamas Kabir and Justice Cyriac Joseph on Monday admitted a petition filed by Rajat Prasad, a Chhattisgarh-based businessman charged with abetment of corruption and criminal conspiracy for taking part in a sting operation on November 5, 2003, in which then Union minister for environment and forests, Dilip Singh Judev, was caught on camera accepting Rs 9 lakh in a hotel room in New Delhi.
Prasad had allegedly booked the hotel room for the rendezvous.
The CBI registered an FIR on the basis of a news report in The Indian Express (?Caught on tape: Union minister taking cash, saying money is no less than God?) on November 16, 2003.
The money was allegedly given on the pretext of obtaining favours from Judev in future ?by abusing his official position as a public servant in the matter of purported projects in the states of Orissa, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand?.
The sting was allegedly the result of a ?conspiracy hatched by Amit Jogi, son of Sh Ajit Jogi, the then chief minister of Chhattisgarh, ?to disgrace Judev just prior to elections for Chattisgarh Assembly, scheduled at end of 2003 in order to derive political mileage? in favour of the elder Jogi.
Appearing for Prasad, senior advocate Harish Salve, assisted by advocate Harris Beeran, submitted: ?Can a sting operation to expose bribery and corruption be equated to abetting the commission of an offence by a public servant? How can a person who exposes corruption be booked for bribery? This is a general and substantial question of law and Your Lordships has to decide on it.?
Agreeing with Salve, the Bench said it would hear the question of law raised in a detailed manner. Additional solicitor general PP Malhotra appeared for the agency.
Prasad had approached the Supreme Court in 2008 after the Delhi High Court refused to quash the charges levied against him by the CBI.
In its counter-affidavit before the Supreme Court, the CBI submitted that ?a person who is party to a sting operation allegedly undertaken to expose bribery and corruption by public servant can be said to be liable to offence under Section 12 (abetment of corruption) of the PC Act with Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code when he or she does not inform the competent law enforcing agency either before indulging into the said operation or at least immediately after the operation is over?.
?Law enforcement is exclusively a function of the government machinery. The concept of allowing each and any private citizen to completely take law into his hands is fraught with the perils of anarchy,? the CBI told the Supreme Court.
It went on to say that if private citizens are given the licence to expose ?corruption? through sting operations then ?each person would then be after the other on the pretext of carrying out sting operation with a view to exposing corruption but also it would inject larger insurmountable ramifications?.