Even as the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Tuesday asked all state governments to make available lists of authorised phone taps by them every month,its request to the states to destroy call records within 48 hours if permission is not given by the competent authority within three days was opposed by many states. The Centre is,meanwhile,putting in place a software that would enable the tracing back of digital footprints to track offenders in cases of any leakage of data and records related to wire tapping. It is expected to be finalised in a month's time and would help agencies detect who leaked the records. At a meeting of state chief secretaries and DGPs here on Tuesday,the MHA also shared its revised list of standard operating procedures (SOPs) for wire tapping with the states. Sources said many DGPs and heads of state intelligence wings strongly opposed the suggestion,saying that in many cases,there was a need to preserve interception records or keep a phone on surveillance even when the required clearances do not reach them within the stipulated period or at times are not given by the competent authority. It is learnt that as a result of discussions at a recent meeting between Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Home Minister P Chidambaram,the MHA agreed to allow the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) to seek tapping of phones of suspects. A committee of secretaries headed by Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar had sometime back suggested that the CBDT should not have the power to tap telephones. It is learnt that as per the new SOPs,while the power to authorise phone tapping would continue to rest with the state home secretaries,the list of authorised telephone interceptions sent by the states would be tallied with the records given by the telecom service providers to the Department of Telecom in order to detect misuse of tapping or illegal tapping. So far,the states are not bound to make any disclosure about tapping being done by state-level agencies.
