New Delhi: Telecommunications secretary Amit Agrawal has reportedly been summoned by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to explain how officials ordered the takedown of more than 100 websites based on fake court orders.
The top official will have to explain the lapse, before leaving for a trip to another state, Reuters reported, citing two government officials.
The agency had earlier reported how telecom officials had directed internet providers to block 129 illegal betting websites based on fake High Court orders which were emailed to officials by people posing as lawyers.
The ministry had initiated an internal investigation into the alleged fraud, while police have sought ministry records as part of a criminal investigation, the report said.
“The action taken by the Department of Telecommunications against betting accounts was carried out through the relevant field officers,” one of the officials said.
Two purported orders from the Rajasthan and Allahabad High Courts were forged to mislead the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) into directing Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to block the websites, the report said.
The DoT reportedly issued two website-blocking directions on July 21 and September 2, attaching copies of court orders purportedly issued by the Rajasthan High Court and the Allahabad High Court.
While the copies appeared to be orders issued by the respective courts, checks with official records revealed that neither of the orders were registered.
The Supreme Court, in July, had set aside a tribunal’s orders that relied on non-existent judgments, and a US judge recently disqualified lawyers over use of fabricated legal citations.
Last year, Supreme Court judges had said such fabrication “bearing forged signatures of Judges strikes at the very foundation of public trust” and “such grave criminal acts cannot be treated as ordinary or routine offences”, as reported by timesnow.in.