What do government
officials in India do when they want to keep information from citizens?
They wrap it up in intrigue and call it a national secret.
When a Hindustan Times reporter asked the government who all were at a
1999 Cabinet meeting headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee during the Kandahar
hijacking, the government’s reply was: it is a national secret. How
long did the meeting last and what were the minutes? Revealing that
under the Right to Information apparently threatens national security
as well.
According to India’s Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah
this is a violation of the law. “Once the action decided upon at a
Cabinet meeting has been completed, papers can be disclosed,”
Habibullah said.
The Cabinet Secretariat rejected an RTI application by a Hindustan
Times reporter seeking information about the Cabinet meeting that
decided to send the then-foreign minister Jaswant Singh to Kandahar.
Three militant leaders — Maulana Masood Azhar, Omar Saeed Sheikh, and
Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar — travelled on the plane with Singh and were
released in exchange for the passengers.
The Cabinet Secretariat said it could not give the information, as it
was exempt under Section 8 of the RTI. These exemptions cover
“information, disclosure of which would prejudicially affect the
sovereignty and integrity of India, the security, strategic, scientific
or economic interests of the State”.
In Kerala, a petitioner was refused details of a Cabinet meeting
decision regarding the setting up of a high court bench in
Thiruvananthapuram, and even a copy of a letter from the state law
minister to the central law minister was deemed a national secret. In
Manipur, public information officers denied so many applicants under
the ‘national secret’ clause that the state’s chief information
commissioner RK Angousana publicly denounced the practice.
The Maharashtra government recently refused to reveal details of an
agreement with a multinational chemical firm, saying it would affect
the integrity and sovereignty of the nation. Punjab’s forest department
used the secrecy clause to refuse information about internal details of
a land law.
In Rajasthan, the government’s Bureau of Investment Promotion cited
similar concerns while refusing to give an applicant the details of a
meeting headed by the chief secretary. That decision was overturned by
the state’s chief information commissioner.
Even the Irrigation & Waterways Department of West Bengal quoted
the clause to deny information. In Jalandhar, the senior superintendent
of post offices invoked Section 8 in denying information about how its
officials had allegedly violated the Income Tax Act. Similarly, the
chairman of a nationalised bank in Andhra Pradesh refused information
about alleged corruption in one of its branches.
RTI campaigner and Magsaysay Award winner Arvind Kejriwal said the
government was wrongfully shielding information. “Denial of information
on names of the people present at a Cabinet meeting — or the minutes of
the meeting, or details of who dissented — do not affect the security
of the country,” he said.
neelesh.misra@hindustantimes.com
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