The Delhi high court Monday sought proper amendment to the petition filed by a journalist alleging that the Centre was trying to "hush up" involvement of the Congress and Reliance Petroleum Ltd [Get Quote], named as non-contractual beneficiaries in the Volcker Committee report on Iraqi oil-payoffs.

A division bench of Justice Vijender Jain and Justice Rekha [Images] Sharma, taking up Sunil Tripathi's public interest litigation filed through counsel Arvind Singh, asked the petitioner to explain clearly as to what was the "discriminatory approach" adopted by the Centre in the scandal on which the Justice Pathak Inquiry Committee had already been ordered.

• Volcker Report

The bench also asked the petitioner to explain the grounds on which the government had failed to exercise the powers vested with it in the matter.

Granting the petitioner two weeks to file the amended petition along with an affidavit, the court posted the matter for further hearing on February 28. 

Earlier, the petition filed on January 4 before the court had sought registration of a first information report against Congress and RPL in the matter, on grounds that no action had been taken against the two entities, even though Natwar Singh had been removed from his ministerial post over the same issue.

Besides registration of an FIR, Tripathi had also wanted the Justice Pathak Committee to probe the involvement of the Congress and the oil company in the affair.

The petitioner had alleged that even the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party was silent on the issue.

He claimed that he had made represenations to All India Congress Committee president Sonia Gandhi [Images] and also the BJP leadership, but no answer had been forthcoming from the two.

The counsel had submitted that only a fair and impartial inquiry into the perceived involvement of influential persons would ensure public confidence in the country's "rule of law".