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The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notice to the West Bengal Government in a PIL seeking disbanding of the Commission which was appointed by the Mamata Banerjee led government to probe into the alleged pegasus scandal.

A bench led by Chief Justice NV Ramana issued notice in the PIL filed by Global Village foundation but refused to stay the proceedings of the committee at this stage, adding that it shall hear the plea along with the Pegasus Petitions listed next on August 25.

The two-member Commission is headed by retired Supreme Court Judge, Justice Madan B Lokur.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta stated that the prima facie act of the state government of constituting such a committee is unconstitutional, "This is all I can say now," he said. 

Advocate Saurabh Mishra appearing for the petitioner said that the state government cannot inquire into the issue, especially since the issue is now being looked at from a pan-India lens.

Last month, Mamata Banerjee, while announcing the commission had said,
“The Cabinet has approved the appointment of a commission of inquiry consisting of Hon’ble Justice M.B. Lokur, retired judge, Hon'ble Supreme Court of India, and Hon'ble Justice Jyotirmay Bhattacharya, retired Chief Justice, Hon'ble High Court at Calcutta, in exercise of the power conferred by Section 3 of the Commissions of Inquiry Act, 1952, in the matter of the widely reported illegal hacking, monitoring, putting under surveillance, tracking, recording, etc., of mobile phones of various persons in the State of West Bengal.”

In another speech, she had appealed to the Supreme Court to take “a suo motu cognisance” of the development or set up an SIT (Special Investigating Team) that will work under its supervision.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court had issued notice to the Union of India today in the Pegasus Petitions pending before it.
 
While the Court did not state that it shall look into the merits and averments of the plea(s) specifically, it did say that it shall consider and decide the future course of action, viz. the setting up of panel of experts (that the Centre suggested) earlier on affidavit.

The Solicitor General of India, Tushar Mehta told a bench led by CJI NV Ramana, Justice Surya Kant and Justice Aniruddha Bose that an additional affidavit revealing details of the surveillance that India adopts will be detrimental to national security and though in no way, he means to suggest that the information will not be disclosed to anyone, to have sensitive information in public domain shall have extraordinary ramifications.

Case Title: Global Village Foundation Vs. Union of India