The Quint: New Delhi: Thursday,
June 30, 2016.
The Cabinet
Secretariat issued an Office Memorandum recently directing all the
Ministries/Departments of the Government of India to upload the major
achievements, significant developments and important events every month on
their respective websites, in a bid to ensure greater transparency.
This Office
Memorandum (OM) comes after a recommendation from the Central Information
Commission (CIC).
The
Background
Venkatesh
Nayak of New Delhi filed an application under the RTI with the Cabinet
Secretariat in January 2015, regarding status of compliance of all Ministries
and Departments, Government of India, with Rule 10 of the Rules of Procedure in
regard to Proceedings of the Cabinet.
Rule 10 of
the Rules of Procedure refers to the monthly summaries to be prepared by each
Ministry or Department regarding the activities and important decisions taken
in each department during that month. The summary should not exceed four pages
and is to be provided for the information of the Council of Ministers.
According to
the rules, the information of both classified and unclassified nature is to be
included in the summary in two separate parts. The classified part has to be
marked as ‘Confidential’, ‘Secret’, or ‘Top Secret’ as the case may be.
The Public
Information Officer (PIO) of the Cabinet Secretariat cited Section 8(1)(i) of
the RTI Act and held that the first part of the information sought is exempt
from disclosure. Sec 8(1)(i) of the RTI Aact reads that the ‘Cabinet papers
including records of deliberations of the Council of Ministers, Secretaries and
other officers’ will be exempted from disclosure. But the provision also says
that the decisions of Council of Ministers, the reasons and the material on the
basis of which the decisions were taken shall be made public after the decision
has been taken.
The PIO also
mentioned that the relevant Ministries or Departments are best placed to decide
whether they can provide the desired information related to Cabinet Papers
after ensuring that the matter is complete.
Aggrieved by
the decision of the PIO and the appellate authority, Nayak filed a second
appeal with the CIC. He contended that this information has been made available
to him in the past and he was also permitted to inspect records on several
occasions, particularly, during the years 2009, 2010, 2012 and 2014.
The
appellant, also stressed on the need for proactive disclosure under the RTI
Act, and that information related to the topics placed on the agenda of the
Union Cabinet may be disclosed once the decision is taken and such a disclosure
is not violative of the RTI act.
The CIC’S
Recommendation
Nayak also
suggested that monthly uploading of the information about the status of
compliance with Rule 10 for every Ministry/ Department on the official website
could be an option. He further stated that these monthly reports are
unclassified and hence not exempted from disclosure under Section 8 of the RTI
act.
The CIC in
its order recommended that the cabinet secretariat considers proactive
disclosure of monthly developments on the website of the relevant department in
the interest of transparency and with a view to informing the public of the
achievements of the Government.
Following the
recommendation of the CIC in April 2016, the Cabinet Secretariat has now issued
an OM directing all the Ministries/Departments of the Government of India to
upload, on a monthly basis, the major achievements, significant developments
and important events for the month on their official websites. The OM also
noted that this is to ensure greater transparency and availability of
information in public domain about the activities of the
Ministries/Departments.
(Published in
an arrangement with Factly.)
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