Indian
Express: New Delhi: Tuesday, June 18, 2013.
In this Walk the Talk on NDTV
24X7 with The Indian Express Editor-in-Chief Shekhar
Gupta, Subhash Agarwal speaks about his RTI activism, his major scoops and why
journalists should use the information tool more often
I am at the heart of what used to be Mughal Delhi
once, in front of Red Fort. I could describe my guest today, Mr Subhash
Agarwal, as the first Mughal—not the last Mughal—of RTI activism. So tell us
the story of how you became the scourge of governments of the day—bureaucrats,
more than governments.
I started with Letters to the Editor for which I
hold a Guinness World Record.
Your letters were even published in the Express...
Of course. In fact, my letters were a regular in
your weekly grievance column. How I got into RTI is that my family was a victim
of the higher judiciary for 16 long years.
In a property dispute?
Yes. My uncle filed some false and baseless case
against my father in 1991 only because his son-in-law was, at that time, a judge in the Delhi High
Court and ultimately, he was elevated to the Supreme Court. So, while he didn’t
have to pay lawyers’ fee, we had to hire legal help at four times that rate and
the lawyers would give up our case midway...There were approaches and
influences always with the judges.
In the sense of bhaichara or brotherhood...
Yes. These are never disclosed and you cannot have
proof or evidence for such influences. Ultimately, the judge committed a major
mistake. He let his official residence be used by my uncle, who was a
petitioner in the case against my father, for his grand-daughter’s wedding.
And the cards had the address?
Yes. The card became documentary evidence. Then I
filed a complaint with the then Chief Justice of India on January 3, 2005—the year in which the RTI Act was introduced. On February 10, 2005, I filed the same complaint with then president APJ Abdul Kalam against
the judge...
...saying that my uncle held his grandchild’s wedding in the judge’s home?
Yes. And that the judge must have recused himself.
I sent several reminders but there was no reply—there was no RTI then. When the
RTI Act came, I was the first person to file the RTI petition with the Supreme
Court even though they refused to accept the petition at that time. But
luckily, I had filed the complaint with the President’s secretariat also. The
President’s secretariat transferred it to the Supreme Court. Then they realised
that we come under the RTI. This is how it all started.
So you discovered then the power of RTI which
nobody had figured until then?
Yes. The media made me strong. The media
highlighted the CIC verdict and that shook the whole of the judiciary.
What happened to these judges then?
After the CIC verdict was published in the media,
there was pressure on my uncle from his son-in-law and his associates in the
higher judiciary, which also included the Chief Justice of India. And then he
had to compromise though we had to pay a price much higher than the value of
(the disputed) property at that time.
But the fact also is that one particular judge who
later rose to be Chief Justice in a High Court could not ultimately come to the
Supreme Court because of your activism.
Right. Mr Kalam held the file of promotion of that
judge for elevation to the Supreme Court.
Even though the Chief Justice nearly overruled Dr
Kalam.
Yes.
You remember that The Indian Express was in the
forefront of following that story from Rashtrapati Bhavan. It’s a story I
cannot yet tell on camera but we paid gravely for that, but we were willing to
pay.
Yes. Your paper has always been the pioneer in highlighting
such malpractices.
I made this disclosure public that our third story
on that issue, I had to then, with great respect and understanding, give to The
Hindu, to Mr N Ram, who played a great editor and published it instead because
circumstances were such that the Express could not have carried it...So, this
was the first time that an RTI activist actually prevented a judge who had
risen to the level of High Court Chief Justice from coming to the Supreme
Court.
He had almost reached the Supreme Court.
But you stopped it. You then realised the power of
RTI. Until then, you knew the power of Letters to the Editor anyway. So how
many letters did you have to write to get into the Guinness Book of Records?
I don’t remember. I know the last updated record—3,699 published in prominent newspapers; not in all the newspapers.
I believe you became a letter writer because of a
personal experience as a student. Tell us about that.
I was very cowardly those days...
Now you are a tiger. The tiger of Old Delhi.
Nobody messes with you.
In those days, there were single-door DTC buses
and the conductor would be at the back. When passengers got off, mostly
youngsters, they would pay half the price of the ticket. So for a 20 paise ticket, the conductor earned 10 paise, you saved 10 paise and the loss was to DTC.
Because if you offered 20 paise and asked for a ticket, he would scream at you.
Yes, that’s what happened to me. I paid the full 20 paise and asked for a ticket. Then he threatened me. He took a 5 paise ticket and tore it to shreds and threw it at me. That was too much
for me. I noted down the bus number, the route number and time. And because I
was too scared to complain about a public servant—I thought I would be sent to
jail if I complained—I wrote all this on a postcard and sent it to a newspaper
with a vague address: ‘Subhash Agarwal, Delhi Engineering College, Delhi’.
You were an engineering student then. Mechanical
engineering?
Yes. At Kashmere Gate. I thought the letter would
not be published because I thought they were published only through influence.
But the letter got published and I was scared. I went to college and after
lunch, my friends told me that a DTC official had come looking for me. I ran
away from college. I thought they had come to arrest me. But when I reached
college the next day, my friends told me that the DTC officials had come to
apologise. That’s when I realised the power of media.
So that was the letters phase and then the RTI
phase. Tell us about your major RTI scoops because, you know, all of Delhi’s
journalists depend on you.
Now I want journalists to take over my task and I
want to be on the other side of the table. Public authorities invite me to
train their officers to handle RTI petitions, I go to educational institutions
and I go to seminars, conduct workshops...
...I believe also to the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy to teach young
civil servants.
Yes.
So tell us about your big blockbuster cases.
I have filed about 6,000 petitions till now.
Of which about 300 have gone into appeal?
Only 600 to the stage of second appellate at the Central Information Commission.
That means, 90 per cent were disposed of satisfactorily at the stage of public
information officer or first appellate authority. To recall the major ones
among these 6,000 is very difficult but the one which gave me tremendous publicity was about
the wealth declaration of judges. After that, most recently, the one on
political parties coming under the RTI.
I must say that we at the Express have an
editorial disagreement with it but that’s beside the point...
Of course. In a democracy, we will have
differences of opinion.
But you were also at the government’s throat on 2G, CWG?
Yes. It was through an RTI petition that I got the
correspondence between A Raja and the PM, mentioning (Attorney General)
Vahanvati’s name. There are many stories about 2G and CWG that I broke. Also
on the Planning Commission (spending Rs 35 lakh on renovating two)
toilets. Now the wealth of ministers is disclosed on the PM’s website. That was
due to my RTI petitions and until it was done, I used to get it through RTI
petitions from the PMO every year. Also, stories about the tour expenses of
(then) president Pratibha Patil and her taking away 150 gift items that are being
returned now—all this was due to the RTI.
So how do you get these ideas? For example, how
would you have got an idea about checking on any gifts that Pratibha Patil may
have taken away with her? Did somebody tip you off?
There are four sources: One is my intuitive mind.
I have been writing Letters to the Editor since 1967. Second, news stories: the
wealth declaration story was based on a news item. Third, journalists: they
give me clues. I have a policy that the journalist who gives me a clue gets the
story.
So you get the information and then give it to
that journalist?
That will be the exclusive story for that
journalist till he/she airs or publishes it. And the fourth source is
anonymous. About Air India, for example, I got anonymous calls and letters
informing about irregularities in Air India. When I filed the RTI petitions,
those turned out to be true.
So in this specific case—the President and the
gifts—from which source did the tip-off come? Was it your intuition, was it a
journalist?
It was a news item. But see, a news item published
in a weekly is not read by everyone. The idea for the (RTI petitions on)
Planning Commission toilets and the gift items of Pratibha Patil were both from
a weekly, a less-read weekly.
So there was a little bit of a gossip item and you
picked it up from there?
Yes. Then I got all the papers from Rashtrapati
Bhavan and shared them with mediapersons.
Tell us, does writing of an RTI require special
skills?
It is by experience.
So what are the skills you need? How can you get a
petition right so you get answers or how do you get a petition wrong so you
only get fudging?
See, it is all by experience. All the Information
Commissioners, especially Mr Wajahat Habibullah and Mr Satyanand Mishra, both
have been my gurus. When I appear before Mr Wajahat Habibullah after a hearing,
he would teach me about the drawbacks in my petition. So they are my gurus.
So instead of trying to block RTI applications,
they actually taught you to maximise its power?
Yes. Exactly.
Have you ever found the government evasive?
In 90 per cent of the cases, I have never approached the Central Information
Commission. How can I say that the government is evasive? You know, I was
always an admirer of the PMO as the best public authority when a particular
lady was the CPIO there.
Who is that?
Sanjukta Ray. Now she has been promoted and does
not handle RTI petitions any more. The staff at the PMO is still very
cooperative, but I think she was quite bold to take up matters with seniors and
she could expose many things.
So did you get the sense at times that the
political class did not understand what a difference the RTI will make?
No, the political class did understand. Most of
the exposures I made were about allies of the major ruling party. So the major
ruling party has the power to tell their allies ki hamara isme koi role nahi
hai...
...that we are not exposing you
Yes, yeh RTI maang rahe hai...
...that there is one Mr Agarwal sitting in Old Delhi who does all this. So
tell me, is it true that the one category of professionals for whom RTI should
have been the most useful has not yet fully learnt to use it? I’m talking about
journalists because activists like you use it, corporates use it now for
corporate espionage and to sabotage the other guy or to put officers off
balance. But journalists haven’t learnt to use it. Why?
This is what I want. Journalists should use it. I
send RTI responses with all the details of how I filed the petition, of how I
filed the appeal, of how I filed the second appeal. I make a pdf file of it and
mail it to all the journalists.
But are journalists lazy? Do they come to you and
say, sir, ek idea...
Exactly. I’ll give you an example. You know that
famous RTI petition (on 2G) about the finance ministry note to the PMO. You know, I took all the
papers—just 60 pages—and shared it with all the journalists, 20 days before another
petitioner broke the news. But journalists have no time to read even 60 pages! This is bad.
Tell us about activism. You were the original RTI
activist, but there are also people like, say, Aruna Roy, Arvind Kejriwal who
campaigned to get RTI. How closely have all of you worked? And how well do you
know them?
I know them very well. Arvind Kejriwal is a very
good friend. We are admirers of each other, but after he formed a political
party, I kept my distance from him. Their ally, Mr Prashant Bhushan, is still
my advocate.
Yes, you work together on many things...
He goes with me in his capacity as an advocate.
You are both each other’s force multipliers.
Yes. Till the CIC, I handle all the cases but
after the CIC, Mr Prashant Bhushan handles all the cases.
And how often do you meet ?
Quite often. Say, about once in a fortnight.
Tell us your experiences with Team Anna because at
one point you were almost in the inner circle, if not formally in the inner
circle.
I regret that it was a failure of the Jan Andolan
movement. The way these movements were taken up, it was not proper. You know,
anshan is like brahmastra...
If I can translate it, a fast-unto-death is like a
nuclear weapon.
Yes. And it should not be used so frequently that
it loses its relevance and especially after it fails once. When the Mumbai fast
failed, they should not have repeated the same story. Then came the Jantar
Mantar fast and they had to break the fast after Anna announced that there will
be a political party. Then Anna backed out, saying I do not favour a political
party.
What’s your view on Anna Hazare?
I respect all of them and I don’t want to comment
on any individual.
Did you interact with him very much? Directly?
No.
And with the others?Arvind Kejriwal...Prashant
Bhushan, of course, is your friend.
I have been interacting with Aruna Roy very often.
I attended all the NCPRI meetings, conferences and seminars. I did attend
Arvind Kejriwal’s conferences till the April 5 fast. After that, I kept
distance because I did not favour the idea of fasting again and again.
Was it distance or was it disillusionment?
No, distance.
Are you now distant or do you see yourself coming
back to that kind of activism? The Jan Andolan kind of activism?
Jan Andolan has failed and this is a matter of
regret. There cannot be a Tahrir Square every time.
So what should be done now to bring about the
change that you wanted when you supported the Jan Andolan? What can bring about
the change?
I’m doing my duty as an individual, as a one-man
army. I have no peon, no person to open my envelopes. I handle 40-50 incoming mails.
I believe that your emails come to my journalist
friends or our reporters late into the night, early hours of the morning. So
you seem to work all night.
I sit at my computer at 9 pm and work till 1 in the morning. Today, I worked till 3 in the morning because I had
to file 12 RTI petitions on the same subject with different public authorities. So I
don’t take a break. Once you take a break, you have to spend another hour to
make up for that time. And I work from 8-10 in the morning. And full day
on Sundays.
I described you as the first Mughal of RTI
activism, you are calling yourself a one-man army. So what does this one-man
army do now? Because RTI is now a tried and tested thing.
Journalists should take up the cause of filing RTI
petitions. Now I want to be a full-timer on the other side of the table.
Join the CIC?
It is up to the government. It is not in my hands.
I believe that they were close to appointing you
and then I think the BJP wanted a candidate of their own.
No. I don’t know if they wanted to appoint me or
not.
But are you happy to be appointed, if you are
appointed?
Yes, definitely. I will apply this time too and in
case the government does not wish to appoint me as an Information Commissioner,
I wish the government may use my expertise as a trainer to the officers who
handle RTI petitions. RTI petitions should not be a terror to public
authorities. This is what I teach in RTI workshops.
While you teach them how to deal with RTI
petitions, you should also teach journalists how to make use of RTI.
Unfortunately, journalists are not ready to be
educated on this.
It’s tough to teach journalists. We know that
better than you. Governments are smart. I’m surprised why they haven’t yet
decided that it is better to have you inside the tent than outside it...
...To get rid of RTI petitions.
Yes. Maybe one day they will do it. But any which
way, whether you are inside or out, you are a wonderful citizen, Subhashji.
Thank you.
Transcribed by Arun Subramanian
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