Live Law: New Delhi: Monday, May 22, 2017.
The privacy
of public servant is becoming a highly contentious issue since the advent of
Right to Information Act, 2005 enabling citizen to seek information about
public authorities and their of×cers. An employee of the state is legally
de×ned as public servant and every citizen will be a virtual employer in
electoral democracy. Can privacy hamper the regime of transparency and scrutiny
of public conduct of the public servant? If government employees privacy is
limited, to what extent? The conØict between right to privacy and need for
transparency is the centre of controversy in many cases before the information
Commissions and Constitutional courts, more so in Girish Ramachandra Deshpandy
case, which travelled from second appeal in CIC to SLP before Supreme Court has
set a controversial standard for ‘personal’ information causing serious damage
to right to information. The apex court’s order of dismissing SLP in Girish
Ramachandra Deshpande is being very frequently used as apex court’s judicial
declaration of law to deny any information about the memos, complaints,
disciplinary action or conduct of the public servant.
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