MP, Odisha and Goa widen CBI’s powers to probe private persons

They said that the notifications have been issued on the advice of the CBI, which was trying to standardise the ‘general consent’ regime for all states following the implementation of the new criminal laws on July 1.

“Different states draft their general consent notifications differently. Earlier, some states mentioned private persons, while others did not. This is merely an attempt to standardise the whole regime. States are free to do what they want with our suggestions,” a CBI officer said. The officer pointed out that while many states had withdrawn ‘general consent’ to the CBI, some states in the Northeast had given the agency jurisdiction even over state government employees, which was not available in other states.

A notification issued by the MP government on July 16 said: “…the Government of Madhya Pradesh in pursuance of Section 6 of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946 (25 of 1946), hereby gives its consent to the extension of powers and jurisdiction of the members of the Delhi Special Police Establishment in the whole of the State of Madhya Pradesh for investigation of the offences …alleged to have been committed by employees of the Central Government, Central Public Sector Undertakings and private persons (whether acting separately or in conjunction with the employees of the Central Government/ Central Government Undertakings)”. Identical notifications were issued by governments of Odisha (June 30) and Goa (July 12).

Sources said in the past many states had not mentioned “private persons” in their general consent orders and it could create legal issues. They said it was to tide over such legal hurdles that the CBI made a suggestion to this effect. “Recently there was a case in Punjab… a bank fraud case… the court asked if CBI had jurisdiction under the general consent given by Punjab over a bank defaulter as he was a private person,” a former CBI officer said.