Economic Times: New Delhi: Saturday,
April 01, 2017.
I think my
pilot husband is having an affair with an air hostess and spending most of his
salary on her - if that sounds like an isolated case of fanciful misgivings of
a suspicious spouse, think again.
Government
departments are besieged with such requests under the Right to Information Act,
from wives of a number of employees of state-run carrier Air India, for
instance, seeking details of salary drawn by their husbands.
Estranged
spouses are increasingly using the transparency law to either arm themselves
with more information about their partner's infidelity to file divorce cases or
get maintenance for children, officials said. In many cases, the spouse
approaches the government department where the husband or wife is employed,
owing to suspicion that there are certain hidden financial assets not disclosed
to them. However, the RTI Act expressly forbids disclosure of "personal
information" such as salary details.
As a result,
most such cases of marital discord are reaching the transparency watchdog,
Central Information Commission (CIC).
A resident of
Akola, for instance, turned to the CIC after the Income Tax Department refused
information on the income tax returns filed by her husband, who had deserted
her. She wanted to find out his whereabouts through his income tax returns.
The CIC took
a view that on humanitarian grounds, generic information from income tax
returns should be given. Similarly, the commission helped a resident of Rohini
in Delhi who approached it after the Income Tax Department refused to divulge
his father-in-law and wife's income tax returns.
When the
resident said that he needed the details to contest a dowry case filed against
him, information commissioner Bimal Julka took a view that in the interest of
natural justice net taxable income of both should be disclosed to him.
"Some
very heart-rending cases have been coming to the commission," Julka told
ET. "There has been a sharp increase in these cases before us. In some the
wife has no source of income and has to support schoolgoing children and she
seeks information about the husband's salary so that she can claim
maintenance." Other information commissioners recounted similar cases
where helpless appellants sometimes broke down in the court during hearings.
"The
commission cannot take sides in a marital dispute. It cannot even be a forum to
decide who is right or wrong. We are custodians of the transparency
legislation," said another information commissioner, who did not wish to
be identified.
"So now
we see if there is merit then we ask the department to divulge gross income so
that fair maintenance can be sought from the court." The commission has
decided to take a liberal view, even as Section 8 (1) (j) of the RTI Act does
not allow divulging personal information.
It says:
"Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no
obligation to give any citizen information which relates to personal
information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity
or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the
individual unless the central public information officer (CPIO) or the
appellate authority is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the
disclosure of such information."