Govt tumbles on legal hurdles in search for next CBI director
5 Nov 2014 5:48 AM IST
As per the Lok Pal Act, which was enacted to empower the probe agency, the premier of the agency has to be appointed by a collegium comprising of the prime minister, the Chief Justice of India or his nominee and the leader of the Opposition (LoP). Now the problem is, there is no LoP in Parliament and as per Lok Pal Act, prime minister Narendra Modi is finding it difficult to look for Sinha’s successor.
It has been learnt that the government is planning to amend some of the clauses in the act to make way for appointing the CBI chief in December. Already the Union Ministry of Law and Justice has been asked to work on the modalities so that India’s top probe agency does not function without any director, considering series of high profile cases, which are yet to be charge-sheeted. ‘Plans are there to dilute some of the provisions in the act, which also include taking over the administrative control of the director of prosecution. Till the amendment is done, the CBI may have only an acting director for few days,’ well placed sources said.
Recently, CBI director Ranjit Sinha has landed into major controversy following reports of his alleged meetings with Kanpur-based meat exporter Moin Akhtar Qureshi at his 2-Janpath residence in the national capital.
Since his joining as a CBI director in 2012, everything was going on track for Sinha till the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) in a petition filed before the Supreme Court claimed that visitors’ entry register at Sinha’s residence is ‘very disturbing’ and contains ‘explosive material’ in 2G spectrum allocation scam against Reliance Telecom.
Then, while going through Sinha’s visitors list, it was reportedly revealed that not only officials of Ambanis and other influential persons but Qureshi had also visited his residence at least 90 times in the last one and half years. The other who has visited Sinha’s residence is Devendra Darda, son of Congress MP from Yavatmal, Vijay Darda. Vijay is an accused in coal scam along with his brother Rajendra Darda.
It has been learnt that the government is planning to amend some of the clauses in the act to make way for appointing the CBI chief in December. Already the Union Ministry of Law and Justice has been asked to work on the modalities so that India’s top probe agency does not function without any director, considering series of high profile cases, which are yet to be charge-sheeted. ‘Plans are there to dilute some of the provisions in the act, which also include taking over the administrative control of the director of prosecution. Till the amendment is done, the CBI may have only an acting director for few days,’ well placed sources said.
Recently, CBI director Ranjit Sinha has landed into major controversy following reports of his alleged meetings with Kanpur-based meat exporter Moin Akhtar Qureshi at his 2-Janpath residence in the national capital.
Since his joining as a CBI director in 2012, everything was going on track for Sinha till the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) in a petition filed before the Supreme Court claimed that visitors’ entry register at Sinha’s residence is ‘very disturbing’ and contains ‘explosive material’ in 2G spectrum allocation scam against Reliance Telecom.
Then, while going through Sinha’s visitors list, it was reportedly revealed that not only officials of Ambanis and other influential persons but Qureshi had also visited his residence at least 90 times in the last one and half years. The other who has visited Sinha’s residence is Devendra Darda, son of Congress MP from Yavatmal, Vijay Darda. Vijay is an accused in coal scam along with his brother Rajendra Darda.
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