Ghost Annas on info-seeking spree, bluff called

Social activist Anna Hazare's call "Main bhi Anna tu bhi Anna" seems to have been taken literally by some. Some Central govt ministries are flooded with RTI applications in the name of Anna. Albeit, all of them misrepresenting him. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Jun 8, 2012, 01:38:29 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Social activist Anna Hazare's call “Main bhi Anna tu bhi Anna” (I am Anna, you’re also Anna) seems to have been taken literally by some. Some Central government ministries are flooded with Right To Information (RTI) applications in the name of Hazare. Albeit, all of them misrepresenting Hazare.

A few central information officers promptly replied to the RTI questions without verifying the efficacy of the applications fearing adverse publicity. But, Central Public Information Officer of Rajya Sabha AK Singh acted differently.

A few months ago the RTI cell of the upper house received an RTI application seeking information regarding certain appointments in Rajya Sabha Television (RSTV). The questions asked were specific and that led to the suspicion. The officials wondered how Hazare knew such minute details about the appointments.

Singh’s office sent an email to Hazare asking whether he had filed any RTI with Rajya Sabha. And, as suspected the reply was in negative. And, discreet inquiries revealed that the RTI was filed by somebody from Rajya Sabha.

The syndrome is not restricted to Rajya Sabha. A few months back a similar RTI application was received in the Environment ministry in name of Hazare, seeking information about a particular project. The application was rejected on the ground of the information being sought was regarding third party and cannot be provided.

“Many ministries have received RTI applications in name of Hazare,” said a Public Information Officer of a key social ministry, who was not willing to be named. “His name has helped in speeding up the process to provide information”.

Team Anna members Arvind Kejriwal or Prashant Bhushan were not available for comments. However, another member of the team said the information officers should seek clarification from Hazare’s office before processing the application.

RTI activist Subhash Aggarwal, whose name has also been used to seek information through RTI, said the prominent names help in getting even sensitive information. “In one case a person filed a second appeal in my name with the Central Information Commission and got a favourable order,” he told HT.

A few other RTI activists to whom HT spoke admitted that they have received information from the government which they never sought.

A Rajya Sabha official said they are now asking for identity details of the person filing an application in case of doubt.

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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