Tamil Nadu chief minister C Joseph Vijay
Chennai: The Tamil Nadu govt withdrew on Sunday a controversial Sept 21 general order exempting the state’s law and order machinery from the purview of RTI Act after political and public backlash. Earlier in the day, the gazette publication of the GO 57 dated Sept 21 went viral, with negative criticism pouring in from all quarters. The GO specified the public (law and order) department as an intelligence and security organisation established by the state govt to which RTI Act shall not apply under Sec 24 of the Act.
“Under Section 24, subsection (4) of the Right to Information Act, 2005, the exemption granted to the public (law and order) department of the govt of Tamil Nadu has been withdrawn with respect to the govt order issued by the human resources management department,” electricity and law minister C T R Nirmal Kumar posted on X. The order would have blocked access to records of custodial deaths, police firing, communal clashes and security-related detentions. The post came about an hour after the minister’s statement, explaining the rationale behind the RTI shield, failed to quell the outcry, including from TVK’s allies. The now-retracted order had sought to classify the law and order wing as an intelligence and security organisation, putting it beyond the ambit of transparency rules governing public disclosure of information. The wing deals with communal and caste clashes, agitations involving political parties, students and agricultural labourers, and requests for withdrawal of cases registered on political grounds.
Nirmal Kumar had earlier argued that only a few sections such as inquiries into related to caste-based incidents would be outside RTI Act’s ambit.