Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram on Thursday said he was perturbed by the statement in the Supreme Court order on the Pegasus snooping matter that many persons "politely declined" to be a member of the probe committee, and asserted that the "episode" illustrated how far the country has travelled from the exhortation of Mahatma Gandhi that Indians should not fear their rulers.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday set up a three-member independent expert panel to probe the alleged use of Israeli spyware Pegasus for targeted surveillance in India, observing the state cannot get a "free pass" every time the spectre of national security is raised and that its mere invocation cannot render the judiciary a "mute spectator" and be the bugbear it shies away from.