Charge sheet 'not public document', cannot be made accessible for free: Supreme Court

A bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar dismissed a PIL seeking free public access to charge sheets, saying that uploading a charge sheet would be contradictory to the rules of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).   

The Supreme Court ruled that charge sheets filed by the investigating agencies in criminal cases cannot be put in the public domain for free access on Friday, January 20, 2023.

A bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar dismissed a PIL seeking free public access to charge sheets, saying that publishing a charge sheet would be contradictory to the rules of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). It said that a charge sheet is not a 'public document' and cannot be published online. 

On January 9, the Supreme Court reserved its verdict on the plea. The Supreme Court had said orally that if FIRs are provided to those unrelated to the matter, such as busybodies and NGOs, they might be misused. 

Advocate Prashant Bhushan argued that it is the responsibility of every public authority to share the information suo motu. 

Bhushan said, "Every public member has the right to be informed of who is accused, who has committed a particular crime."

The Supreme Court was hearing a petition filed by journalist Saurav Das under Section 173 of the Code of Criminal Procedure seeking free public access to police charging sheets.

(With inputs from PTI)