New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday appointed a three-member expert committee to examine the allegations by petitioners in Pegasus spyware thoroughly and submit the report eight weeks after the hearing. 

The three-member committee will be headed by RV Raveendran, former Supreme Court Judge. Other members will be Alok Joshi and Sandeep Oberoi. 

Supreme Court said, "There has been no specific denial by Centre in the issue, thus we have no option but to accept the submissions of petitioner prima facie and we appoint an expert committee whose function will be overseen by the Supreme Court". 

Supreme Court said that initially when petitions were filed court was not satisfied with the petitions filed based on newspaper reports, however, various other petitions were filed by the ones who were direct victims.

The Chief Justice of India (CJI) N.V.Ramana had reserved the order on September 13, indicating that Court-monitored technical committee to probe the matter. In last month, CJI told the petitioner’s counsel that some of the members of the proposed expert committee expressed unwillingness to be part of the same, thus constitution of the committee getting delayed he said.

The batch of petitions was heard by Chief Justice of India (CJI) NV Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli.

Israel based spyware firm NSO is best known for its Pegasus spyware, which it claims is sold only to “vetted governments” and not to private entities, though the company does not reveal which governments it sells the controversial product, reported Bar and Bench.