Plea challenging Nageswara Rao’s appointment as interim CBI director to be heard by Supreme Court

Next week, the Supreme Court will hear a plea against the appointment of Nageswara Rao as the interim head of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Filed by Common Cause – an NGO and the social activist Anjali Bharadwaj, it seeks to challenge the order of January 10 of appointing Rao as interim CBI head after the removal of Alok Verma as director of the CBI.

Filed by advocate Prashant Bhushan, the process of short-listing, selecting and appointing the director of CBI should remain a transparent process as per the plea. In violation of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act (DSPE Act ), the current appointment of Nageswara Rao has been described to be ‘illegal, arbitrary’ and ‘mala fide’ by the petition.

The petition also refers to the approval of the appointment of Nageswara Rao on January 10 by the Appointment Committee of the Cabinet to be the outcome of an ‘earlier arrangement’.