Repatriation of CIC secretary is a setback to RTI, say activists

The CIC had earlier this month implemented the directive of the cabinet committee of appointments to send back its secretary Anjali Anand Srivastava to her parent cadre of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG).

Published on: Apr 19, 2018, 24:32:46 IST

Hindustan Times, New Delhi | By Chetan Chauhan

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In what is perceived as another setback to Right to Information (RTI), the government has repatriated the administrative head of the Central Information Commission, the body mandated under law to hear appeals against government for denial of information, to her parent cadre.

Activists say repatriation of CIC secretary is a setback to RTI. (Illustration: Jayanto)

The CIC had earlier this month implemented the directive of the cabinet committee of appointments to send back its secretary Anjali Anand Srivastava to her parent cadre of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG).

“Upon acceptance of the premature repatriation order of the competent authority… Anjali Anand Srivastava is relieved of her duties as secretary, the Central Information Commission,” said an order issued by Shanti Priya Beck, joint secretary at the commission.

RTI activists consider it as another blow to the provision as the commission is already working on a depleted strength of six information commissioners and a chief information commissioner. By December this year, another four information commissioners, including the chief, will retire.

“We are already seeing that non-filling of vacancies in the commission has led to a rise in the pendency of cases. And, this has had a detrimental impact on the efficacy of the RTI law that empowered citizens to ask questions,” said RTI activist Lokesh Batra, whose many appeals are pending with the CIC.

Anjali Bhardwaj of the Nati- onal Campaign for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI) said the government is also trying to “weaken” the CIC by downgrading the status of information commissioners. The government has proposed that the information commissioners should get salary and allowances equivalent to a secretary, government of India. At present, it is the same as that of a Supreme Court judge.

Activists also say repatriation of Srivastava is part of a series of attempts to dilute the impact of the transparency law.

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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