He added that the high court had overlooked Section 2 of DSPE Act which empowered the Centre to issue the Resolution in 1963 in the shape of an executive order to create the CBI, a special police force envisaged under the Act.
Immediately after a bench of justices Sathasivam and Ranjana P Desai stayed the HC judgment, a buoyant Vahanvati walked out of the CJI's residence, where the hearing was held, and indulged the waiting TV cameras with a rare interaction over the case he successfully argued. Prior to the stay, CBI director Ranjit Sinha was heard saying, on a lighter note, that he was without a job.
In appealing against the HC verdict, the department of personnel and training (DoPT) - the administrative ministry for the CBI - acted with speed rare for the government. The decision to appeal against the verdict in the apex court on Saturday was taken on Friday evening after minister of state for personnel V Narayanswamy met the AG.
Within an hour, the task was assigned to a team of four lawyers led by advocate Devadatt Kamat, which worked through the night and handed over the final draft of the appeal to the AG at 6am on Saturday. After his clearance, advocate B V Balram Das filed the appeal at 11.30am in the SC registry with a request for urgent hearing. Acceding to the request, the hearing was fixed at 4.30pm at the CJI's residence.
The high court's bench of justices I A Ansari and Justice Indira Shah on Wednesday had upheld the constitutional validity of DSPE Act, but ruled that "the CBI is neither an organ nor a part of the DSPE and the CBI cannot be treated as a 'police force' constituted under the DSPE Act".
Countering this logic, the DoPT cited five judgments of the Supreme Court, which had accepted that the CBI was set up under the DSPE Act, and said the HC could not have gone beyond the rulings of the highest court.
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