  Industrialist Ratan Tata on Thursday questioned the credibility of the inquiry conducted by the Income Tax Department into conversations of the corporate lobby Niira Radia.
In an affidavit before the Supreme Court, Ratan Tata said that the inquiry has been conducted in a manner that would hardly inspire public confidence.
"On this account, the department which conducted the wire tap has been under scrutiny. Since this is all done at a fairly high level within the departments, for any inquiry to be fair and transparent, it would have to be done by an outside agency skilled in making investigations - this has not been done," Tata complained.
The Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to the central government on a plea by Tata Sons chairman Ratan Tata seeking a copy of the income tax department''s report on its probe into the leak of former corporate lobbyist Niira Radia's taped conversations.
The apex court bench of Justice G.S. Singhvi and Justice S.J. Mukhopadhaya, while issuing the notice, asked the government to file its response within three weeks. The case would next come up for hearing March 27. "The unauthorized disclosure of intercepted material is in blatant violation of the provisions of the Official Secrets Act, 1923, whether intercepted by the government or by a service provider as its agent and the data collected and information contained therein is a property of the government. Any unauthorized disclosure thereof constitutes violation of Section 5 of OSA," Tata said |