Friday, April 24, 2015

RTI Act: Info Officer Gets Protection

Indian Express: Thiruvanathpuram: Friday, April 24, 2015.
Section 21 of the Right to Information Act (RTI), which guarantees legal protection to public information officers has never been invoked in the state or in the country for that matter. In a clear deviation from this, it was invoked for the first time in a case in which a public information officer was victimised by his higher official for giving out information on an RTI query.
Highlighting Section 21 of the RTI Act, the State Information Commission observed: “No suit, prosecution or other legal proceedings shall lie against any person for anything which is in good faith done or intended to be done under this act or any rule made thereunder.’’ It also pointed out that the public information officer does not have to seek the permission of his higher-ups before disseminating any information.
K G Vijayakumar, then an administrative officer of Horticorp and currently, the Director of Printing, Government Press, Thiruvananthapuram approached the State Information Commission alleging that the Principal Secretary of the General Administration Department had ordered a probe against him as the then MD of the Horticorp, Pratapan, had lodged a complaint against him.
“My fault was that I have handed over every details sought in an RTI query. I was first transferred to Child Rights Commission,” he said.