Will Amicably Resolve With CBI Issue Regarding Sharing Of Documents : Maharashtra Govt Tells Bombay High Court

A division bench of Justices SS Shinde and NJ Jamadar was hearing CBI's application against the State's non-cooperation in handing over former State Intelligence Department (SID) head Rashmi Shukla's letter, along with its report with its annexures.

During the hearing on Monday, Senior Advocate Rafiq Dada said the State will resolve the issue with CBI without mentioning if they would share the document or not.

"We will be able to reconcile the matter. [Sr Adv Darius] Khambata and I had a meeting with the highest officials. We will work it out with the ASG. We will put an end to this."

Dada then sought time till Thursday, which the court willingly granted.

On Friday, the bench had expressed displeasure at the State's refusal to share the report and asked them to reconsider documents they would be willing to give.

"We need to go back…The trigger to approach HC(earlier) was two requisitions by the CBI, Rashmi Shukla's report and the minutes of the meeting of the Police Establishment Board. The copies of those two letters were annexed to your petition, and you said that by misconstruing HC's earlier order the documents are sought."

"You didn't succeed. We made certain clarifications regarding the scope of the investigation, but our order doesn't say the two documents are not relevant. Our order says that even if those documents are given, the CBI cannot use them to enter into an unfettered investigation and look into each transfer." Justice Jamadar said, referring to State's plea to quash certain portions of CBI's FIR."

CBI's plea states that it had written a letter to the State Intelligence Department (SID) seeking details of Shukla's communication, but it was refused on the grounds that the document was part of an ongoing investigation and not relevant to the ongoing probe.

The CBI had registered an FIR on April 21, following Bombay HC's orders to conduct a Preliminary Enquiry into the Rs. 100 crore corruption allegations levelled by former Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh in his letter to the Chief Minister on March 20, 2021.

Case Title: The State v. CBI