The ever-growing volume of cases being transferred to the CBI is only adding to its burden: the agency has a backlog of 8,297 cases.
NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation may be the ultimate point of referral for many high-profile cases, but it is not equipped to consistently deliver swift resolution. Officers say the agency is not only ‘hard pressed’ for resources, but also works under ‘various pressures’.
The ever-growing volume of cases being transferred to the CBI is only adding to its burden: the agency has a backlog of 8,297 cases. Of these, some 244 have been pending trial for more than two decades.
A recent list of pending cases collated by the agency has revealed that trials in more than 2,000 cases, part of a 10-year-old pile, have not begun.
“The number of pending cases has been a long-standing concern,” a senior officer said. According to the officer, most of the cases relate to misappropriation of government funds, frauds, and accumulation of assets disproportionate to known sources of income.
The agency has several dubious records of slackness to its name. A case in point is the 1975 murder of Union railway minister Lalit Narain Mishra. The court has been recording the statements of five accused for more than 13 years.
The 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy, in which nearly 3,000 people died, offers another example of the CBI’s limited powers. The agency was handed the case in December 1984, but the accused are yet to be extradited.
“We have the personnel to handle a maximum of 900 cases in a year,” the officer said. “But we have been receiving around 1,500 cases. Since most cases involve crores of rupees and complicated criminal conspiracies, investigations take time.”
The backlog list revealed that investigating teams have not even formulated charges against the main suspects in 438 cases registered a decade ago.
In another unsettling instance, a 32-year-old case from Bihar – relating to bungling of funds meant for police uniforms – continues to be heard in court.
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