Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Thursday directed the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to file an affidavit clarifying if it displayed personal details of all RTI applicants on its website or if activist Saket Gokhale had been “singled out”. A bench led by Justice Nitin Jamdar directed the ministry to file its additional affidavit within two weeks.
The bench was hearing a plea filed by Gokhale. Gokhale, who was inundated with hate calls and messages after he filed a plea in Allahabad High Court in July seeking a stay on the ‘bhoomipujan’ of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya in view of COVID-19 pandemic, alleged that his personal details were made public by the ministry.
He should be paid a compensation of Rs 50 lakh for the trauma he underwent, his petition demanded. As per the activist’s plea, his details were displayed on the website in November 2019 and removed in September this year, after he wrote to the ministry.
The ministry’s counsel Rui Rodrigues, however, told the court on Thursday that although the department of personnel and training (DoPT) had issued two notices in 2016, asking all government departments to refrain from displaying personal details of RTI applicants, the I&B ministry had not received such communications at the time when it made Gokhale’s details public. Rodrigues also said that the details of other applicants had also been displayed on the ministry’s website at the time, and the same were deleted when the DoPT notices were received.
The bench said the ministry must clarify in an affidavit if details of all RTI applicants were put up despite 2016 directions, when the notices were received by the ministry, and when the details were removed from its website. “We want to know if details of all applicants were displayed on your website or if the petitioner was singled out,” the bench said.
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