Dr. S. MURALIDHAR, J.

Introduction

1. 1.1 Questions of law concerning supply of copies of documents, gathered by the prosecution during investigation, to an accused person at the pre-charge stage arise for consideration in these petitions. It involves the interpretation of Sections 173 (5) and 207 of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973 (CrPC), Sections 3 and 65B of the Indian Evidence Act 1872 (EA) and Sections 2 (o) read with Section 2 (t) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act).

2. 1.2 In order to appreciate the issues that arise a brief background is being set out. The petitioners here are persons accused of offences under Section 120-B IPC and under Sections 7 to 12, 13 (2) read with 13(1) (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (PC Act) in four different cases. In the charge sheets filed in the four cases, the prosecution has stated that as part of the investigation, intercepted telephonic conversations between the accused persons were recorded on four hard discs (HDs) in the computer systems kept at the office of the Special Unit (SU) of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in New Delhi. The charge sheets further state that these conversations took