Hindustan Times: Ahmedabad: Sunday, February 21, 2016.
Three retired
civil servants who spent decades perfecting the art of secrecy have been
selected to the transparency watchdog, Central Information Commission (CIC), by
a top panel headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
When they
join the commission in a few days, the NDA government will break more than one
record.
It will be
the first time the watchdog will have a full complement of 10 information
commissioners apart from the chief information commissioner since the CIC was
constituted in 2005.
Nine of these
10 commissioners will be ex-civil servants who, until a few days ago, were busy
blocking transparency initiatives while two will be retired spooks. The odd man
out at the CIC is a former law professor from Hyderabad’s Nalsar University,
Sridhar Acharyulu.
They will be
the new custodians of the people’s right to information.
Amongst the
three commissioners being appointed is Divya Prakash Sinha, an IPS officer who
made his mark in the murky world of espionage. For years, Sinha headed the
intelligence bureau’s counter-terrorism division and was closely involved in
terror probes against Islamic as well as right-wing extremists.
Retired IAS
officers former Staff Selection Commission chairman, Amitava Bhattacharya, and
former information and broadcasting secretary, Bimal Jhulka – are the other two
information commissioners.
Sinha will
not be the only retired intelligence officer at the commission; there already
is Yashovardhan Azad, a retired IPS officer who spent much of his career in the
intelligence bureau. Incidentally, both men retired from the same post of
Secretary (Security) that oversees the functioning of the Special Protection
Group that guards the prime minister.
Azad and
Rajiv Mathur, a former intelligence bureau director who made it as the chief
information commissioner for a brief spell, were appointees of the UPA
government.
Parking
lot for the retired: A new record
The NDA isn’t
the first to turn the watchdog into a parking lot for ex-bureaucrats. But it is
the first time that 90% of them have come straight from the government or
government-run firms.
According to
a study released by the RTI Assessment and Advocacy Group (RAAG) in 2014,
nearly 60% of all information commissioners across the country were retired
civil servants. Also, retired IAS officers accounted for 77% of all chief
information commissioners.
For the
record, the RTI Act had envisaged a wider pool of talent, it argued, pointing
that this was also important to inspire public confidence. It asked that
commissioners have wide knowledge and experience in law, science and
technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or
administration and governance.
The
writing on the wall
The
administrative reforms commission sounded the alarm bells early in 2006 when it
proposed a change in the rules that ensured at least 50% of the information
commissioners wouldn’t be civil servants.
However, the
recommendation was promptly rejected.
Ex-babus
reluctant to penalise...
RTI activist
Anjali Bhardwaj of the Society for Citizens Vigilance Initiatives draws a link
between the high proportion of ex-babus in information commissions and their
reluctance to impose penalties for wilful delay.
“The RAAG
study found that penalties were imposed in only 4% of the cases decided by
commissions where there was a delay in providing information,” Bhardwaj said,
wondering what made retired intelligence officers or IAS officers such experts
in the transparency law.
... But
they know the system
RTI activist
Subhash Chandra Agrawal, however, felt that too much was being made of civil
servants being appointed to the commission.
“In my
experience, it really does not matter... At the end of the day, it depends on
the mindset of the person concerned,” Agarwal insisted.
“One of the
best information commissioners I have seen was Satyananda Mishra, a retired civil
servant. And a non-babu commissioner was notorious for his anti-transparency
attitude,” he added.
Agarwal
recalled how in an appeal he filed, the department of personnel and training
officer tried to mislead the commission at a hearing. Mishra promptly caught on
and pulled up the officer, reminding him that he had headed the department
before his retirement and knew the systems well.
No
vacancies for the first time
The CIC has
always lived with vacancies as part of what, one government officer said, had
been an unwritten strategy within the civil services to bring about a situation
where the panel was overburdened.
“This ensured
that appeals over a period of time take a long time to be heard... reducing the
commission’s effectiveness, and nuisance value,” the officer – who was closely
associated with the appointment process in the past – told Hindustan Times.
For instance,
the CIC had started out with five commissioners in 2005. By 2008, it had eight.
In 2011, there were as few as five and in 2012, there were only seven of them.
But the
credit for this record does not entirely go to the government; RTI activists such
as Lokesh Batra and RK Jain had earlier moved the Supreme Court in this regard.
At its last hearing, the court gave the government six weeks to complete the
selection process. Thursday’s meeting of the selection committee that
rejected Delhi Police Commissioner Bhim Sain Bassi’s claim was timed to enable
the government to comply with the apex court’s deadline that ends this week.
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