NEW DELHI: The technical committee constituted by the Supreme Court for investigating the alleged use of Pegasus spyware has sought comments from the public on 11 queries.
The questionnaire can be filled online at https://pegasus-india-investigation.in/invitation-to-comment/ on or before March 31.
The top court had set up the committee in October 2021 under retired Supreme Court judge R V Raveendran.
The questionnaire has sought people’s views on whether the existing boundaries of state surveillance of personal and private communications of citizens, for the purposes of national security, defence of India, maintenance of public order and prevention and investigation of offences are well defined and understood.
It also asks about the sufficiency of the procedures currently defined under the Telegraph Act, 1885, and the Information Technology Act, 2000 (including executive oversight measures), to prevent the excessive routine use, misuse or abuse of state surveillance, justified for the reasons mentioned above.
One of the questions asked is if there should be special safeguards for specific categories of persons. If so, what categories of persons should these cover and what form should these take?
The questionnaire also seeks to know if the state should be obliged to record or disclose surveillance technology that it has access to or has used for the purposes of national security, who this information should be disclosed to and in what form.
It has further asked if this information should be available under the purview of Right to Information.