Mumbai The special NIA court on Monday rejected the plea filed by Arun Ferreira, one of the accused in the Elgar Parishad case, seeking a copy of the order authorising Pune police, which initially investigated the case, to intercept emails which are used as evidence against them.
Ferreira had in his plea alleged that that the electronic (email) communication between “Sreelal@riscup.net” and “lokayan2015@riseup.net” were intercepted by the investigation agency (Pune police) on July 9, 2018, July 14, 2018, August 6, 2018 and August 12, 2018 and the material derived therefrom was being lead as evidence by the prosecution.
He alleged that these emails had been downloaded within an hour of being sent to the other email id, which allegedly belongs to one of the absconding accused. He said that this falls under the definition of interception under provisions of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
However, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) refuted the claim and maintained that electronic devices seized during the course of investigation from Rona Wilson, another accused in the case, were sent for forensic examination to a forensic science laboratory. The agency added that the data was analysed and accordingly the email ID sreelal@riseup.net and its password was recovered.
Besides, the special court on Monday also directed the prison authorities to hand over the letters and personal communications sent by the wife of Surendra Gadling to him.
Gadling had alleged that personal communications of his wife sent on December 11, last year which included citations, medicines, postal slips of earlier sent applications were not handed over to him by the Taloja prison authorities.
Gadling claimed that even though they were received by prison two days after having been sent by his wife, the parcels were not delivered to him. He said several parcels containing court documents of other cases and letters from friends were not handed over to him. He had also alleged that the prison authorities opened the parcels and packets in the absence of the prisoners. The court has now asked prison authorities to hand him all his parcels and letters.
