Prashant Bhushan tells SC, he is burdened

NEW DELHI: Activist lawyer Prashant Bhushan today told the Supreme Court that he was "burdened" with all sorts of documents supplied to him by whistleblowers and sought creation of a "credible body" to safeguard their cause in public interest.

"Today I am burdened. People think I alone can do and they send me documents. It is not possible for me to do everything alone. There is a need for a credible body," he submitted before a bench headed by Justice M B Lokur, which was hearing matters relating to coal block allocation scam.

He said there was a need to enlarge the domain for the whistleblowers by setting up a credible body of citizens where they could provide information.

Bhushan said despite the apex court's decade-old directions on whistleblowers' protection, nothing has moved and whenever any information is sent by them to the Central Vigilance Commission, it simply masks the identity and refers the issue back to the concerned departments.