Rahul Gandhi vs Modi on CBI chief selection is a sideshow. The agency shouldn’t exist at all |
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Rahul Gandhi vs Modi on CBI chief selection is a sideshow. The agency shouldn’t exist at all
Before examining what the CBI cannot do, it is worth recalling that it may have no legal right to do anything at all.
Rahul Gandhi’s dissent letter questioning the constitutional propriety of the Central Bureau of Investigation’s Director selection process spotlights an organisation that has long outlived its utility. The question is not who should lead the CBI, but whether it continues to serve any useful purpose in the federal polity of India.
Once derided as the “Congress Bureau of Investigation” by BJP in opposition — a charge conveniently forgotten upon assuming office — the agency earned its most memorable epithet from the Supreme Court itself: a “caged parrot speaking in its master’s voice.” That indictment led to a tripartite selection mechanism — the Prime Minister, the Leader of Opposition, and the Chief Justice jointly recommending the Director. It was designed to insulate the appointment from executive capture.
Even that safeguard was tested. On 23 October 2018, Director Alok Verma was placed on forced leave without charges or notice; his subordinate M Nageshwar Rao handed charge overnight. The Supreme Court reinstated Verma on 8 January 2019. Forty-eight hours later, a PM-led committee — voting 2:1, with Mallikarjun Kharge dissenting — removed him on the basis of a Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) report without an opportunity to respond. He was posted as Director General, Fire Services, refused the assignment, and resigned from the IPS on 11 January 2019. “The selection committee didn’t consider the fact that the entire CVC report is premised on charges alluded by a complainant (special director Rakesh Asthana) presently under investigation by the CBI,” Verma said in a statement.
A house built on sand
Before examining what the CBI cannot do, it is worth recalling that it may have no legal right to do anything at all. The Gauhati High Court, in a path-breaking judgment of 8 November 2013 (Navendra Kumar v. Union of India), struck down the very establishment of the CBI on the ground that it had been created through an executive notification despite police being a State subject under the Constitution. The court ruled that the Central Government could not confer investigative powers on an agency not founded under........