Rafale Review Petition Live: Bhushan Focuses On Errors Of Fact In Judgment; Attorney General Targets Hindu’s Reports 

The Chief Justice told the Attorney General to stick to whether or not the review petition can't be heard.

Justice KM Joseph also aggressively questioned the Attorney General

• If a grave crime had been committed, of corruption, are you really going to hide behind national security?
• Illegally obtained evidence can still be admissible if it is relevant.
• Can make a limited objection on the grounds that the source of the information needs to be disclosed, not that it can't be used.

Meanwhile, Prashant Bhushan alleged that the Attorney General’s comments before lunch amounted to an attempt to intimidate the petitioners. “It amounts to criminal contempt,”

Attorney General resumed his arguments countered the point raised by Bhushan that Official Secrets Act is overridden by the Right To Information Act.

Even under the RTI Act, information that affects security and sovereignty of the country is not disclosed, he said.

Venugopal also read out a note published by The Hindu and said that the document was marked as secret, under the Official Secrets Act.

The petitioners are totally oblivious to the effects of a Central Bureau of Investigation inquiry into the Rafale case, KK Venugopal added.

Here are the other highlights from the Attorney General’s arguments:

• Defence Ministry note that alleged PMO interference in the deal was meant to be kept secret.
• The word "Secret" on the top of the page was cropped from The Hindu's article.
• This article has been referred to in the review petition as evidence.
• Look at the damage done by publishing this information - talks about the need for aircraft to combat F-16s, says these objections cause delay

Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi informed Aam Aadmi Party Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh's lawyer, Sanjay Hegde, that the bench will not hear Singh's review petition because Singh had made derogatory remarks about the court regarding Rafale and Alok Verma cases.

CJI Sanjay Singh's lawyer

• Which political party does Singh belong to?
• What more we are going to do with him, we will decide. We are certainly going to do something with him.
• He has made certain statements related to the Rafale case.

The Court asked the Attorney General on what action has been taken by the government since documents were found to be stolen from the Defence Ministry.

Venugopal replied that action was being contemplated, including against The Hindu newspaper.