Govt of India "refuses" to make public laws, regulations that protect RAW agents abroad, rejects RTI plea

By Our Representative
The Government of India has rejected a right to information (RTI) plea seeking information about “laws, rules and regulations” that explain the nature and the extent of legal protection provided to officers and employees of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), who are engaged in overseas intelligence operations.
In his RTI plea to the Cabinet secretariat in January 2016, senior Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) activist Venkatesh Nayak had also sought information regarding “procedures, norms, instructions or guidelines” that contain details of the action that must be taken by the Government of India to defend the officers and employees of RAW engaged in overseas intelligence operations.
He had also sought information the action that the Government of India is obliged to take upon receipt of information about the death of any officer or employee of RAW who was engaged in overseas intelligence operations, due to any adverse action taken against him/her by any agency in a foreign country.
Nayak says, by refusing the information, the Government of India is stating that, while it wants citizens to work for them to gather and analyse intelligence for maintaining the external security of the country, they will not tell people what mechanisms exist for ensuring their safety and security.
The RTI plea acquires importance against the backdrop of a recent report of arrest of a person of Indian origin by Pakistan's law enforcement agencies. While Pakistan summoned India's envoy to that country and issued a demarche about the alleged "interference” by India in its internal affairs in Balochistan through R&AW, the official spokesperson for the Ministry of External Affairs vehemently denied it.
However, the Ministry confirmed the apprehended individual is a retired Indian Navy officer and has sought consular access to him.
Pointing out that “there is no information in the public domain about what must be done, if, heavens forbid, an Indian intelligence operative were to be murdered abroad”, Nayak believes, “This is a concern that is very much valid even though it must not be taken as a comment on the latest incident of the apprehension of an Indian national in Pakistan.”
Two weeks after the RTI plea was filed, Cabinet Secretariat rejected the RTI application stating that all the information sought pertained to the organization is “exempt” from the purview of the RTI Act under Section 24. “Interestingly, the CPIO does not even mention the name, R&AW in his reply. So high is the level of secrecy”, comments Nayak.
Saying that the reply “is in tune with past attempts which frustrate all efforts to secure basic transparency in the working of exempt organizations”, Nayak says, in 2014 the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) replied to an RTI plea that the actions of left wing militants in blowing up a CRPF convoy resulting in the deaths of CRPF personnel in Bihar and Chhattisgarh during election duty “did not amount to human rights violation of the deceased”.
“I hope the same attitude is not adopted by the intelligence agencies in relation to their operatives who are posted abroad”, Nayak says, adding, “The citizens of India have the right to know what measures the Government is required to undertake by law to ensure the safe return of its external intelligence operatives even though they may not have been involved in the latest case as clarified by the Government.”
“R&AW is also not transparent about the manner in which it deals with RTI applications year after year”, Nayak says, adding, “The Central Information Commission's Annual Report for 2014-15 lists only one instance of rejection of an RTI application under Section 24 for the entire year.”
Noting that “it is highly unlikely that R&AW received only one RTI application during this period”, Nayak says, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) “received more than a thousand RTI applications in 2014-15. Of these 95.5% requests were rejected by invoking Section 24 of the RTI Act.” The IB is India's premier internal intelligence agency.

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NYT seeks UN intervention, says: Modi turning autocratic, talks absurd on Kashmir

By Our Representative
In what appears to be a scathing reply to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s much-publicized “New York Times” (NYT) article on Mahatma Gandhi titled “Why India and the World need Gandhi”, NYT’s powerful editorial board has said, Modi “didn’t address” the Kashmir issue in his United Nations (UN) speech, calling his assertion at the Houston rally a few days – that revoking the constitutional clause on Kashmiri autonomy meant “people there have got equal rights” with other Indians – “absurd”.

Ceramic worker dies: 20,000 workers in Thangadh, Gujarat, 'risk' deadly silicosis

By Our Representative
Even as the country was busy preparing for the Janmashtami festival on Saturday, Hareshbhai, a 46-year-old ceramic worker from suffering from the fatal lung disease silicosis, passed away. He worked in a ceramic unit in Thangadh in Surendranagar district of Gujarat from 2000 to 2016.
Hareshbhai was diagnosed with the disease by the GCS Medical College, Naroda Road, Ahmedabad in 2014. He was found to be suffering from progressive massive fibrosis. He is left behind by his wife Rekha sister and two sons Deepak (18) and Umesh (12),
The death of Hareshbhai, says Jagdish Patel of the health rights group Peoples Training and Research Centre (PTRC), suggests that silicosis, an occupational disease, can be prevented but not cured, and the Factory Act has sufficient provisions to prevent this.
According to Patel, the pottery industry in the industrial town of Thangadh has evolved for a long time and locals as well as migrant workers are employed here. There are abou…

Gujarat's incomplete canals: Narmada dam filled up, yet benefits 'won't reach' farmers

By Our Representative
Even as the Gujarat government is making all out efforts to fill up the Sardar Sarovar dam on Narmada river up to the full reservoir level (FRL), a senior farmer rights leader has said the huge reservoir, as of today, remains a “mirage for the farmers of Gujarat”.
In a statement, Sagar Rabari of the Khedut Ekta Manch (KEM), has said that though the dam’s reservoir is being filled up, the canal network remains complete. Quoting latest government figures, he says, meanwhile, the command area of the dam has been reduced from 18,45,000 hectares (ha) to 17,92,000 ha.
“According to the website of the Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Ltd, which was last updated on Friday, while the main canal, of 458 km long, has been completed, 144 km of ranch canals out of the proposed length of 2731 km remain incomplete.
Then, as against the targeted 4,569 km distributaries, 4,347 km have been constructed, suggesting work for 222 km is still pending. And of the 15,670 km of minor canal…

Cess for Gujarat construction workers: Spending less than 10%; no 'direct help' to beneficiaries

By Our Representative
While the Gujarat government’s Building and Other Construction Workers Welfare Board, set up in 2004, as of March 31, 2019, has collected a total cess of Rs 2,097.62 crore from the the builders, it has spent less than 10% -- Rs 197.17 crore. And, as on May 31, 2019, the total cess collection has reached Rs 2,583.16 crore, said a statement issued by Bandhkam Majur Sagathan general secretary Vipul Pandya.
Pointing out that just about 6.5 lakh out of 20 lakh workers have been registered under the board, Pandya said, vis-à-vis other states, Gujarat ranks No 13th in the amount spent on the welfare of the construction workers, while 11th in the amount collected.
And while the builders are obliged to pay just about 1% of the total cost of their project, the calculation of the cess is flawed: It is Rs 3,000 per square yard; accordingly, Rs 30 per square yard is collected. “Had the cess been collected on the real construction cost, it would have been at least Rs 7,000 cr…

Why nobody objected to Gautam Gambhir, Sunny Deol in t-shirt, jean?: Activists

By Our Representative
Mimi Chakraborty and Nusrat Jahan’s excitement on their first day as MPs was overshadowed by a barrage of sexism over their ‘non- sanskari’ outfits, a group of civil society activists have said in a statement. According to Aarushi Nigam, Divya Kaushik, Riya Sharma, Ruman Ganguly, and Anulekha Agarwal, both Bengali actors and first-time MPs "were certainly excited to take them on when they posted pictures from their new workplace on social media."
Hit by misogynistic comments, the activists say, "Their choice of workwear – jeans and a white button-down shirt for Mimi, a wine-coloured peplum suit for Nusrat – was the first and last word on their political competence for many."
“You’re not on vacation”, “they have mistaken Parliament for Kolkata’s Nicco Park or City Centre”, “this is not a photo studio, this is a place where you should fight for people’s rights and legislate”, “keep some respect towards your Bengali society” were some of the &quo…

132 Gujarat citizens, including IIM-A faculty, others declare solidarity with Kashmiris

Counterview Desk
A week after it was floated, 132 activists, academics, students, artists and other concerned citizens of Gujarat, backed by 118 living in different parts of India and the world, have signed a "solidarity letter" supporting the people of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), who, it claims, have been silenced and held captive in their own land. The signatories include faculty members and scholars of the prestigious Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A).

Amit Shah 'wrong': Lack of transparency characterized bank frauds, NPAs, jobs data

Counterview Desk
India's senior RTI activists Nikhil Dey, Anjali Bhardwaj, Venktesh Nayak, Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, Dr. Shaikh Ghulam Rasool, Pankti Jog and Pradip Pradhan, who are attached with the National Campaign for Peoples' Right to Information (NCPRI), have said that Union home minister Amit Shah's claim that the Government of India is committed to transparency stands in sharp contrast to its actual actions.

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