What to ask and what can be rejected under RTI.. some interesting judgements are these ones..
In a blow to an indicted former R&AW official seeking detail of the agency's snooping software, the Delhi High Court has set aside the CIC’s directive to the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) to disclose information, which he claimed was necessary to prove his innocence in the espionage case. Asking the CIC to hear the matter afresh, Justice S Muralidhar held the Commission erred in passing the order without hearing R&AW contentions, being the third party for which the C-DAC developed the software under a contract. “In as much as the software of the ‘Project Anveshak’ has been developed exclusively for the R&AW, the question of disclosure of any such information had to be decided only after hearing the R&AW,” the court noted further, observing that the intelligence agency figured among the list of the organisations usually exempted under the purview of the RTI Act. Last May, the CIC had allowed the RTI plea of former Director (Computers) R&AW, Brig Ujjal Dasgupta (retd), asking the C-DAC to provide him information relating to the development of software ‘Anveshak’ for R&AW. Lodged in Tihar Jail following his arrest in 2006 on charges of passing on classified information to American diplomat Rosanna Minchew, Dasgupta had sought details about the way the software was transferred to R&AW, the agency responsible for installation on the premises of RAW and other such details. He contended the information would help him defending himself in a court of law. The C-DAC, however, sought the immunity of exemption clause of the RTI Act and said the Cabinet Secretariat had also communicated to it that disclosure of any information in relation to Project Anveshak would be against national interest and the security of the state Full version at http://www.indianexpress.com/news/espionage-hc-quashes-cic-order-on-spying-software/605027/ Anilkumar BVN
