Daily News Capsule

The Supreme Court on Thursday said that the media report about Pegasus spying is a serious matter, if true. The top court has asked the petitioners to give copies of their petitions to the central government.

The top court questioned the petitioners that there was no attempt by the persons affected by espionage to file a criminal complaint with the police before approaching this court.

A bench of Chief Justice NV Ramanna and Justice Surya Kant asked the petitioners to give copies of the petitions to the central government and posted the matter for further hearing on Tuesday. However, the Supreme Court has not yet issued a formal notice to the central government in this matter.

During the hearing, the Chief Justice said, “If the reports in the media are true, then the allegations are of serious nature. I also do not want to say that there is nothing in the arguments. We are also not saying that some of the petitioners have not been affected by this. Some claim that their phones have been hacked.

But the question is why did they not try to file a criminal complaint. The top court was hearing nine petitions seeking a probe into the Pegasus espionage case.

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• Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for petitioner senior journalist N Ram, termed Pegasus as a “rogue technology” and said it was a technique to subvert the national interest. Through this, our lives have been infiltrated without our knowledge. The phone entered our lives. It is an attack on privacy, human dignity, and our republic.
• The Chief Justice also questioned all the petitioners that this issue had come up in 2019 but why was no serious concern raised then?
• The Chief Justice also said, “The people to whom the write petitions have been filed are more knowledgeable and resourceful.
• They should have worked harder to gather more material in this matter.
• In this case, apart from Sibal, senior advocate Shyam Dewan Arvind Attar Rakesh Dwivedi Shiv Singh Meenakshi Arora appeared on behalf of the petitioners.
• However, during the hearing on Thursday, no law officer on behalf of the central government was present in the court.

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