HC directs DVAC to upload its crime manual on website within six weeks.

The Hindu: Madurai: Wednesday, Feb 25, 2015.

In a significant judgement, the Madras High Court Bench here on Tuesday ordered Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) to upload its crime manual, a compilation of government instructions and guidelines to investigating officers on the mode of enquiry to be adopted by them in corruption cases, on its website within six weeks.

Justice M. Sathyanarayanan passed the order after rejecting the submission of the DVAC that the manual was a privileged document and it could not be made public. The judge held that the DVAC was not entitled to claim such a privilege in the era of Right to Information Act and especially when the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) itself had hosted its crime manual on its website.

The order was passed on a batch of cases filed by a few public servants who wanted to mark the manual as one of the documents before the trial court to prove that the investigating officer in the corruption case against them had not followed procedures prescribed under the manual. The DVAC had refused to issue a copy of the manual to them and hence the present petitions.

One of their counsels, F. Deepak, argued that the directorate could not insist on keeping the manual secret much to the disadvantage of the accused who required it desperately to establish their innocence during the course of trial.

He also recalled that the State Information Commission had directed the DVAC to furnish a copy of the manual to an RTI applicant on November 28, 2011.

The directorate challenged the commission’s order by filing a writ petition in the High Court. Justice D. Hariparanthaman dismissed the petition in December 2012 and upheld the information commission’s order. Wondering why the manual should be kept a secret, the judge said: “I am not able to understand as to why the DVAC feels shy to furnish the manual.”

He added: “At this juncture, I wish to refer to the submission by senior counsel G. Rajagopalan for Tamil Nadu Information Commission that the manual is not exempted from disclosure as per section 8 of the RTI Act… Therefore, the RTI applicant is entitled to the manual.” “Despite this order, the DVAC continued to maintain the manual as a secret document,” the counsel added.