CIC to unveil information sought by murdered, attacked RTI activists

In a landmark decision, the Central Information Commission (CIC) has decided that if an RTI activist is murdered or assaulted, the information the person had sought would automatically be brought into the public domain by uploading it on the website of the department concerned.

''If the information seeker is attacked, all the information will automatically be available in the public domain and the purpose of the attack to prevent information to be made public will be defeated,'' said information commissioner Shailesh Gandhi. ''As soon as 10-15 such actions are taken, it will prove as a deterrent.

People who want to hurt an RTI activist, do it to stop the information coming out. But if such info is released I think it means they are doing more damage to themselves so the expectation is that such incidents will go down.''

Last year, there were nearly 30 instances when RTI activists were attacked by goons across the country, acting on behalf of vested interests whose activities were exposed following the publication of details.

The most notorious cases were in Maharashtra, where two RTI activists – Satish Shetty, who exposed land scams in Pune, and Vittal Gite, who exposed irregularities in a village school in Beed – were killed. Two other activists were also killed in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat.

The CIC has also decided that it will directly obtain information about probes into attacks on RTI activists from the police, instead of waiting for government agencies to act. ''In most cases the RTI applicants are common people and do not have that sort of influence which the attackers may have,'' said Gandhi.