CIC blasts Govt for exempting CBI from RTI

The Central Information Commission has described the Central government’s decision to exempt the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from the Right To Information (RTI) Act “not in consonance with law as it constricts the citizens fundamental right as in a manner not sanctioned by the RTI law”.

Updated on: Jul 1, 2011, 23:49:22 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Central Information Commission has described the Central government’s decision to exempt the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from the Right To Information (RTI) Act “not in consonance with law as it constricts the citizens fundamental right as in a manner not sanctioned by the RTI law”.

The stinging remark came in an order related to the CBI refusing to provide information related to investigation in Ghaziabad’s civil court provident fund scam.

The CBI had absolved Supreme Court and high court judges of any wrong doing and had submitted a chargesheet against some district judges. Main accused turn approver Ashutosh Asthana had died in police custody during investigation.

One of the accused Justice (retired) RN Mishra of Allahabad had filed an RTI application with the CBI seeking details of the investigation. The CBI refused information saying it will provide vital information in confidence during investigation of the case.

Information Commissioner Shailesh Gandhi asked the CBI to provide information after deleting the names of the officers involved in investigations after ruling the government’s order of exempting the CBI from RTI purview was not as per law.

“The CBI is not an intelligence or a security organization which requirement needs to be satisfied in order for it to be covered under section 24 of the RTI Act and therefore, it cannot be included in the second schedule,” Gandhi said in his order. The section 24 provides for exempting intelligence and security agencies from purview of the RTI Act.

The CIC also said that the Department of Personnel and Training, which issued the notification to exempt CBI from RTI on 9 June does not provide reasons to justify the same. “In absence of reasons, inclusion of CBI in the second scheduled along with National Intelligence Agency and National Intelligence Grid appears to be an arbitrary act,” he said, while terming the government’s notification not in consonance with law.

The CIC’s observation comes at the time civil society activists such as Aruna Roy had taken up the issue of exempting CBI with the Sonia Gandhi headed National Advisory Council. The RTI activists had claimed that the CBI was exempted without conducting any public debate on merits and demerits of the move.

The CIC amply made its anguish against the government decision clear by saying that inclusion of CBI in the second schedule would be considered to be a step to avoid gaze and monitoring by citizens in matter of corruption. The CBI is investigating the CWG and the 2G scams.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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