In what can be seen as a fallout of the leak of intercepted telephone conversations of lobbyist Niira Radia, a committee headed by the cabinet secretary KM Chandrasekhar has recommended that the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) be taken off the list of agencies authorised to request wiretaps.
This recommendation, among others, follows the assurance given by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that phone tapping regulations would be revised and made more stringent.
The committee met several times on the subject and its final recommendations are understood to be with the PMO for clearance and dissemination to the departments.
The cabinet secretary?s review was attended by home and law secretaries, besides secretaries from the department of telecommunications and the finance ministry?s revenue department.
Officials said that there was ?unanimity? among the officials present that given the concerns in the corporate sector over ?over-zealous? wiretapping in the wake of the Radia tapes, the CBDT or the Income Tax Department need no longer have authorisation for requesting the home ministry to allow telephone interception. The Supreme Court is currently hearing a petition filed by Ratan Tata on wiretaps being an infringement of privacy.
Meanwhile, the finance ministry is readying to submit its final report on the leak of the Radia tapes to the court. Not allowing the taxman to tap has a political resonance as well. Following the publication of some of the intercepted conversations of Radia, the Parliament had witnessed heated debates on the subject. While home minister P Chidambaram ? who was finance minister when the CBDT obtained the contentious interception order ? stated that ?financial security? too had to be safeguarded, leader of opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley had strongly criticised the CBDT being allowed the power of telephone interception. ?Mere suspicion of tax evasion cannot be equated with public safety and public emergency ? the two situations which allow the government to intercept calls and messages,? he had said. At the peak of the controversy, the CBDT itself had issued a statement stating that ?the provision (of telephone interception) was used (by them) in rare and exceptional cases of suspected fraud involving security of the State.?
