New Delhi: The Supreme
Court today cited a possible dent in national security to dismiss a
public interest plea that had sought a directive to ensure that the
accounts of the country’s premier intelligence agencies were audited to
make them accountable to Parliament.
"We feel a judicial order to
audit the agencies will create a dent in our functioning and security.
This would lead to a dangerous situation," a bench headed by Justice
Dipak Misra told advocate Prashant Bhushan who appeared for the NGO
Centre for Public Interest Litigation.
"Sorry, we will not interfere. We must give them room to work and there is no need for judicial interference," the bench added.
The
NGO had filed the PIL alleging that agencies like the Intelligence
Bureau, RAW and the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO)
enjoyed unbridled financial and snooping powers.
Bhushan said
officials working with various agencies were, in the name of gathering
intelligence, spending crores of rupees from the public exchequer.
"There is no account of how much and where they spend," he said.
Attorney
general Mukul Rohatgi had opposed the PIL on the ground that an audit
would expose intelligence officials, who were already vulnerable because
of the nature of their job. "How can we have auditing when the country
is facing so much of hostility from all sides," Rohatgi argued.
"We
are not inclined to entertain this petition. Executive powers co-exist
with legislative powers also," the bench said, rejecting the PIL. "We do
not think the court should entertain such… petitions which deal with
the security of the country."
Earlier, the Centre had in an
affidavit told the court it was not necessary to put in the public
domain any detailed information on sensitive organisations like RAW, the
IB and the NTRO as they all worked for national security.
The
Comptroller and Auditor General, the Centre claimed in the affidavit
last year, regularly audits the accounts of these organisations.
"Putting information on public domain will only dilute and put to risk
the sensitive organisations working for national safety and security."
In
other words, the Centre’s stand is that the IB, RAW and the NTRO,
although not created under statutory provisions like other government
agencies and departments, discharge sensitive functions and hence their
activities cannot be subject to public scrutiny like other government
organisations.
The NGO, which filed its PIL in 2013, had
complained that the three intelligence agencies were functioning without
any statutory authority. Their role, the PIL alleged, included tapping
people’s phones and monitoring their activities, thereby infringing upon
a citizen’s fundamental right to liberty that Article 21 of the
Constitution guaranteed.