NEW DELHI: A Delhi court has said journalists cannot refuse to reveal source of information of their news reports if such disclosure is required for the purpose of investigating a case.
"There is no statutory exemption in India to journalists from disclosing their sources to investigating agencies, more so where such disclosure is necessary for the purpose of aiding and assisting in investigation of a criminal case," Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Anjani Mahajan said.
The court directed the CBI to carry out further investigation in a case related to forgery of status report on probe in disproportionate assets case against Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family members and its subsequent publications in various media outlets.
The court rejected untrace report filed by the CBI. It issued notice to the Investigating Officer for filing supplementary report on March 24, 2023.
The court, however, rejected protest petition filed by PIL petitioner Vishwanath Chaturvedi, saying he is "rank outsider" and has no locus standi in the matter.
In its detailed order, the court said, "Further enquiry is required to be conducted from the concerned journalists on the aspect of their respective sources from whom they received the purported impugned forged documents which became the basis of their respective news items. Further, based on such information, additional clues regarding the identities of the culprits who entered into the alleged criminal conspiracy, prepared and fraudulently and knowingly used as genuine the forged document by providing it to the media/ getting it published/aired, could be found and probed. Further investigation on this aspect is thus required to be conducted."
The court further said, "The investigating agency can always bring to the notice of the concerned journalists the requirement of disclosure of the source being essential and vital to the investigation proceedings."
The court further pointed out the investigating agency is fully equipped under the IPC and CrPC to require the public persons to mandatorily join in an investigation where the investigating agency is of the opinion that such public persons are privy to any facts or circumstances pertaining to the case under investigation and public persons are under a legal duty to so join the investigation.
"Further, investigation is also required to be carried out by the CBI on the modus operandi adopted by the culprits for gaining access to/obtaining the official documents including probing involvement of any insider in the acts alleged and preparing the alleged forged 17 pages review note," the court said.
The CBI, for its part, said that during investigation, relevant documents were requisitioned from the concerned news channels but they had not given any document on which their news reports were based.
"Merely because the concerned journalists denied to reveal their respective sources, as stated in the final report, the investigating agency should not have put a halt to the entire investigation," the court said.
The court noted as per averments in the final report, the two alleged forged status reports dated 30.07.2007 and 20.08.2007 contained several paragraphs lifted from the undated status report of the CBI which was kept in sealed cover for the perusal of the Supreme Court of India.
"The final report is totally silent on the aspect of investigation, if at all any conducted, as to how the official document i.e. the undated status report of the CBI which was kept in sealed cover and got leaked before it was to be filed before the Apex Court, from the office of CBI, ultimately reaching the media. Further, as per the opinion of the FSL expert, the signatures of Smt. Tilotama Varma had been lifted from the original note-sheet and compressed and reproduced on the alleged 17 pages review note. The final report does not disclose any investigation done, on the aspect of how the forger could have gained access to the original note-sheet of Smt Tilotama Varma, DIG CBI, from which the signatures had been lifted, compressed and reproduced on the alleged forged document as per opinion of the CFSL," the court said.
The court said the CBI is well within its power to direct the concerned journalists/news agencies by way of notices u/s 91 CrPC etc to provide the required information and bring to their notice the requisite facts of the case warranting disclosure of the information as per law.
The court also noted t although it is stated in the final report that the concerned journalists Deepak Chaurasia, Bhupinder Chaubey and Manoj Mitta had been examined, however, the copy of statement of only Bhupinder Chaubey u/s 161 CrPC is on record and it is only Bhupinder Chaubey who is mentioned as a witness in the list of witnesses filed by CBI alongwith the initial final report.
"I may note that in the list of witnesses filed alongwith the supplementary untrace report, the name of Bhupinder Chaubey as well as names of certain other witnesses mentioned in the original list of witnesses have inexplicably been removed by the CBI which requires a re-look by the CBI. There are no statements u/s 161 CrPC of Deepak Chaurasia and Manoj Mitta on the record nor are they cited as witnesses in either of the lists of the witnesses filed by the CBI," the judge pointed out.
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