The Supreme Court on Monday issued a notice to the CBI on the petition of two Naval officers facing charges in the “war room leak” case for supply of certain documents to them.
The petitions was moved by commander Jarnail Singh Kalra (retd) seeking access to certain “confidential” documents being relied upon by the CBI against him and others in the Navy war room leak case.
A bench of Justices Markandey Katju and Gyan Sudha Misra issued the notice after Cmdr Kalra’s counsel submitted that unless the documents were made available to the accused persons, they would not be able to defend themselves during the trial.
Cmdr Kalra and another Naval officer S.S. Rathore moved the apex court after the Delhi high court had rejected their plea, holding that the documents, which were claimed to be “confidential” by the defence forces could not be parted with by them.
The apex court gave the CBI four weeks to respond to their plea as the two officers also have sought stay of the trial till the matter of supply the documents was resolved by the apex court.
The CBI had registered a case in 2006 on a reference from the defence ministry after examining the report of the inquiry committee of the Indian Navy that some vital information about Navy’s “war room” was leaked and the two officers were accused of the leakage.