‘Arbitrary exemptions’ to RTI February 2nd, 2009 By Our Corresponden

Feb.1: The exemption of as many as 33 agencies in the home and public departments from the purview of the Right to Information Act in Tamil Nadu defeats the very objective of the law enacted to promote transparency and accountability of public authority, say RTI activists.

Founder of the anti-corruption awareness movement, M. Sivaraj said the exemption of the home and public department, civil supplies CID and directorate of vigilance and anti-corruption was arbitrary.

“Even the Centre had not totally exempted the Home and Public departments including the files related to the transfers and promotion of IAS and IPS officers. But the Tamil Nadu government is the only government which is making injurious exemption to the RTI Act,” he said. The DVAC and state vigilance commission dealt with corruption cases involving government officials and the exemption would benefit corrupt officials, he said.

“As per section 8 (H) of the RTI Act, disclosure of information which would impede the process of investigation or apprehension and prosecution of offenders is exempted. There is no point in exempting DVAC and SVC from the act completely,” he said adding that every investigation department has an administrative wing, which should not be exempted from the act. V. Gopalakrishnan of Fifth Pillar said the Centre had exempted only 18 intelligence and security organisations from the RTI Act.

“The state should reconsider the exemption given to so many agencies from the RTI Act,” he said.