The Supreme Court of India has appointed a committee presided by Justice (Retd.) R V Raveendran to inquire into the Pegasus revelations.

The judgment comes at a time when the principal author of the judgment and the Chief Justice of India N V Ramana, has noted, in the context of institutional independence, that when there is “a lot of discussion about the pressure from the executive, it is also imperative to start a discourse as to how social media trends can affect institutions.”

Here is a tacit acknowledgement of a general environment in which public trust is lacking in the judiciary. In this backdrop, the order of the court constituting the committee attains significance for three clear reasons.