Amid continuous protests by opposition parties over the Pegaus controversy, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a batch of pleas on the alleged snooping scandal on August 5.
The petitions that will be taken up by a bench comprising Chief Justice NV Ramana and Justice Surya Kant also include the one filed by senior journalists N Ram and Sashi Kumar, who have sought an independent probe by a sitting or a retired judge into the alleged Pegasus snooping matter.
The bench would hear three separate petitions seeking probe into the reports of alleged snooping by government agencies on prominent citizens, politicians and journalists by using Israeli spyware Pegasus.
“The targeted surveillance using military-grade spyware is an unacceptable violation of the right to privacy which has been held to be a fundamental right under Articles 14 (equality before the law), 19 (freedom of speech and expression) and 21 (protection of life and personal liberty) by the Supreme Court,” said the plea, filed by the two journalists.
“Such an act has an obvious chilling effect on expression by threatening invasion into the most core and private aspects of a person’s life,” it added.
The opposition parties have been targeting the Centre over the alleged hacking of more than 300 verified mobile phone numbers, including of opposition leaders, journalists, judges, activists and current ministers, through Israeli Pegasus spyware sold only to government agencies.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee, election strategist Prashant Kishor, two Union ministers, Prahlad Patel and Ashwini Vaishnaw, are reportedly among the potential targets of alleged snooping.
Following the immense backlash, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said the report about the alleged snooping has been amplified by few with only one aim – to humiliate India at the world stage.
“This is a report by the disrupters for the obstructers. Disrupters are global organisations which do not like India to progress. Obstructers are political players in India who do not want India to progress. People of India are very good at understanding this chronology and connection,” he had said in a hard-hitting statement.
