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HC can order CBI probe

From the archives of The Times of India 2010

HC can order CBI probe: SC

Swati Deshpande | TNN

Mumbai: A five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court headed by the Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan, on Wednesday adjudged that the country’s high courts can order a CBI probe into a case without the assent of a state government, while also cautioning that such powers should be used sparingly, and only in matters of national or international importance.

The SC was hearing the West Bengal government’s petition challenging the Calcutta high court order of a CBI probe into the Midnapore firing in which 14 Trinamool Congres workers were killed. The WB government argued that law and order was a state subject and that a CBI probe without the state’s nod would be a ‘‘destruction of the federal character of the Constitution’’. West Bengal was the main petitioner along with some southern states.

But, taking a stand based on the ‘‘higher principle of constitutional law’’, attorney general Goolam Vahanvati argued that the powers of the high courts and the Supreme Court under Articles 226 and 32 were coupled with a strong obligation to prevent injustice in sensitive cases and to protect the fundamental rights of citizens. The SC bench agreed with him, and dismissed the petition. Until now, the CBI conducted probe in any state only with prior consent of the concerned government under the provisions of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act.

The five-judge Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justices R V Raveendran, D K Jain, P Sathasivam and J M Panchal agreed unanimously with Vahanvati but said the power must be exercised sparingly in ‘‘exceptional and extraordinary circumstances.’’ Otherwise, the CBI will be flooded with such directions in routine cases, the bench said.

Khan Bahadur Qurban Ali Khan: first chief of the Special Police Establishment- SPE

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

April 03, 2013

The Central Bureau of Investigation has approached the external affairs ministry with an unusual request. It wants the ministry to facilitate the India visit of the Lahore-based family of a Pakistani who had helped set up the country’s spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence. The reason: the man in question, Khan Bahadur Qurban Ali Khan, was the first chief of the Special Police Establishment (SPE), the forerunner of CBI. Khan is to be honoured posthumously during the upcoming golden jubilee celebrations of CBI. Khan, who was an officer of the erstwhile Indian Police during British rule, will be among a host of former directors of the country’s premier probe agency who will be honoured at the April 6 event.

CBI came into existence in 1963 and has also renamed one of the blocks in its Ghaziabad Academy after Khan. SPE was started in 1941 by the British government to investigate cases of bribery and corruption in transactions of the War and Supply Department of India, which was set up during World War II. Its headquarters were in Lahore and Khan, who was then superintendent of the war department, was made its chief administrator. After the end of the war, it was felt that a central agency was needed to investigate cases of bribery and corruption by government employees. The Delhi Special Police Establishment Act was brought into force in 1946 and Khan headed this department till partition.Khanrose to become the governor of NWFP from 1954 to 1955. Khan is considered to be one of the founding members of Pakistan’s spy agency ISI, formed in 1950. Besides gathering external intelligence, ISI was also monitoring uprisings in NWFP where Khan was a top police official.