Govt. drops bombshell in SC: Rafale documents stolen from defence ministry

March 6: The Union government on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that the documents related to Rafale fighter aircraft deal have been stolen from the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Union government further stated in the apex court that petitioners are violating the Official Secrets Act by relying on classified documents, the government told the Supreme Court today as the court’s notice was drawn to a newspaper report. “These documents were stolen from the Defence Ministry either by former or present employees. These are secret documents and can’t be in the public domain,” the Attorney General told the court, representing the central government.

A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and comprising Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice KM Joseph heard the matter. In the marathon hearing, the Centre told the apex court that documents pertaining to the deal have been stolen from the Defence Ministry and that the papers relied on by the petitioners were marked secret and, therefore, in violation of the Official Secrets Act.

Former Union Ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie and advocate Prashant Bhushan, who had jointly filed the petition, alleged that the Central government suppressed crucial facts when the apex court decided to dismiss the batch of PIL (public interest litigation) petitions against the Rafale deal in December.

Reacting to the government’s charge, N Ram said documents related to the Rafale deal were published in public interest and nobody would get any information on the sources who provided them.”We have not stolen anything. We got it from confidential sources and we are committed to protecting these sources. Nobody is going to get any information from us on these sources. But the documents speak for themselves and the stories speak for themselves,” said Mr Ram.

The government also used the argument of “national security” in its defense of the Rafale deal, prompting one of the judges in the three-judge bench, Justice KM Joseph, to say, “Suppose great crime is committed, are you going to take shelter under national security?”