SC to hear Pegasus snooping plea on August 5

Senior journalists N Ram and Sashi Kumar had filed petitions seeking an inquiry headed by a sitting or retired judge of the apex court to investigate into the reports of the government using Pegasus. Besides the plea filed by Ram and Kumar, two separate petitions on the issue have been filed in the apex court by advocate M L Sharma and John Brittas.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court will on August 5 hear the pleas, including the one filed by senior journalists N Ram and Sashi Kumar, seeking a court-monitored probe into the reports of the central government allegedly using Israeli software Pegasus to spy on politicians, activists, and journalists.

Senior journalists N Ram and Sashi Kumar had filed petitions seeking an inquiry headed by a sitting or retired judge of the apex court to investigate into the reports of the government using Pegasus to spy on politicians, activists, and journalists. A Bench headed by Chief Justice of India NV Ramana had on July 30 said the court would hear the plea filed by Ram and Kumar next week after senior advocate Kapil Sibal for the petitioners mentioned the matter for urgent hearing.

Besides the plea filed by Ram and Kumar, two separate petitions on the issue have been filed in the apex court by advocate M L Sharma and John Brittas. The petitions alleged that targeted surveillance using military-grade spyware was an unacceptable violation of the right to privacy which has been held to be a fundamental right under Articles 14, 19 and 21 by Supreme Court in KS Puttaswamy case. The targeted hacking, interception of inter alia journalists, doctors, lawyers, civil society activists, government ministers and opposition politicians seriously compromises the effective exercise of the fundamental right to free speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a), the petitions pointed out.

The petition also seeks a direction to the Centre to disclose if the government or any of its agencies obtained licence for Pegasus spyware and used it, either directly or indirectly, to conduct surveillance in any manner.

An international media consortium has reported that over 300 verified Indian mobile phone numbers were on a list of potential targets for surveillance using Israeli firm NSO's Pegasus spyware.