CBI case: SC's decision would ensure highest standard of fairness, says Jaitley

New Delhi, Oct 26: Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Friday (October 26) said the Supreme Court's decision to order a time-bound CVC probe into the feud between CBI Director Alok Verma and Special Director Rakesh Asthana would "ensure highest standard of fairness".

The Supreme Court today said that it will ask the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) to inquire into both the Director and Special Director of the CBI under the supervision of retired Supreme Court judge, Justice A K Patnaik.

"Today SC has further strengthened the fairness criteria. They fixed a time limit&in order to ensure that highest standard of fairness are maintained even in the inquiry they have appointed a retired judge to ensure that the CVC inquiry is extremely fair," Jaitley told the media.

He termed SC order as "extremely positive development", and said the government is not taking any sides in this entire matter.

"Government has no interest for or against any individual. Governmen is interested in maintaining professionalism, image and constitutional integrity of CBI," Jaitley said.

"Recent developments had eroded the credibility of CBI. CVC in the interest of fairness passed an order that till investigations are pending against two top officers of CBI, they must step aside and recuse themselves from CBI functioning till inquiry is over," he added.

The Centre and the CBI were asked by the apex court to provide the CVC report in a sealed cover within 10 days. Upon this direction, the CVC pleaded that 10 days for CBI inquiry is not enough as it has to look into several documents. The top court then granted two weeks' time to the CVC for concluding the probe.

This is a matter of national importance and there cannot be any further delay. We want to see a preliminary probe report in ten days and then decide whether it would require further probe, the Bench headed by Chief Justice of India, Ranjan Gogoi, said.

The court also said that in the interim, the interim director of the CBI, M Nageshwar Rao will not take any decisions. He will only do a routine job to keep the CBI going, the Bench said. Further the Bench also asked the Centre to give it in a sealed cover the decisions taken till date by the interim director after he was given charge.