Tuesday, May 28, 2013

हम क़ानून में विश्वास करना सीखें



हम क़ानून में विश्वास करना सीखें

यह देख कर वास्तब में कई बार बहुत दुःख होता है कि हमारे कई सारे वरिष्ठ अधिकारी भी क़ानून और न्यायालयों को कुछ समझने से बहुधा इनकार करते दिखते हैं और इस प्रक्रिया में वे कई बार न्यायालयों तथा अर्ध-न्यायिक संस्थाओं द्वारा दण्डित भी होते रहते हैं. अभी पिछले दिनों उत्तर प्रदेश में एक बहुत भारी संख्या में वरिष्ठ अधिकारियों को कथित रूप से मा० हाई कोर्ट की अवमानना के आरोपों में दण्डित होने के दृष्टांत बहुत दूर नहीं हैं.

आज मैंने अपनी आखों के सामने एक ऐसा ही दृष्टांत देखा जब मुख्य सूचना आयुक्त, उत्तर प्रदेश श्री  रणजीत सिंह पंकज ने उत्तर प्रदेश के आईजी कार्मिक पर 25,000 हज़ार रूपए का अर्थ दंड लगाया. श्री पंकज ने यह आदेश कथित रूप से बार-बार आदेशों के बाद भी मुझे सूचना नहीं दिये जाने के आरोप में यह दंड लगाया.

दरअसल मैंने अपनी ही लिखी अपने काव्य संकलन आत्मादर्शके सम्बन्ध में डीजीपी  कार्यालय से कुछ सूचनाएँ मांगी थी. मामले में जानकारी नहीं दिये जाने पर जन सूचना अधिकारी से प्रथम अपीलीय अधिकारी और वहाँ से मुख्य सूचना आयुक्त तक प्रकरण गया. जब वहाँ भी सूचना नहीं मिल रही थी तो पीछ;ली सुनवाई के दिन मुख्य सूचना आयुक्त ने कुछ कठोर निर्देश पारित किये.  

आज सुनवाई के दौरान जब मुख्य सूचना आयुक्त ने देखा कि वांछित सूचना नहीं मिली है और उसकी जगह सूचना नहीं दिये जाने के कुछ ऐसे कारण बताए गए हैं जो उनकी दृष्टि में सही नहीं थे तो उन्होंने यह अर्थ दंड लगाने के आदेश दिये.

यह बात वास्तव में अजीव और कष्टप्रद लगती हैं कि हम वरिष्ठ अधिकारी भी कई बार सीधे-सीधे क़ानून का उल्लंघन करते दिखते हैं जबकि हमारा स्वयं का दायित्व ही क़ानून की रखवाली करना और क़ानून का पालन करवाना है. कई बार यह भी दिखता है कि बहुत सारे वरिष्ठ अधिकारी आरटीआई एक्ट की जानकारी नहीं रखते और उसके आम जनता के लिए लाभ को नहीं समझना चाहते.  आरटीआई एक्ट एक बहुत ही सरल एक्ट है जो सरकार और प्रशासन को आम जनता के लिए खोलता है और हमें इसके  प्रभाव को देखते हुए इसका सम्मान करना चाहिए. हमें इसे पूरी तरह समझ कर इसका सही उपयोग होने में आम जन की मदद करनी चाहिए जिससे यह एक्ट अपनी पूर्णता में जनता के काम आ सके
.

जिस भी क्षण प्रत्येक सरकारी सेवक इस एक्ट को पूरी तरह समझ जायेंगे और यह बात भी दिमाग में पूरी तरह डाल लेंगे कि वे क़ानून नहीं हैं बल्कि क़ानून का पालन कराने के लिए सरकार की ओर से बैठाए गए उसके नुमाइंदे हैं, उसी क्षण हमारी बहुत सी समस्याएं समाप्त हो जायेंगी और देश की भी. इससे आम आदमी को भी बहुत अधिक राहत मिलेगा. 

लेकिन असल प्रश्न यही है कि क्या हम ऐसा करने को तैयार हैं या हम क़ानून को तोड़ने और इसका उल्लंघन करने में ही अपनी शान समझते हैं?

अमिताभ ठाकुर

Let us believe in laws

Let us believe in laws

It does really pain when one finds senior officers getting penalized from judicial and quasi-judicial forums. The last few says saw a very large number of senior UP Government officers being indicted severely by the Hon’ble High Court for their alleged contemptuous acts.

Today I saw one such case before me when in one of my matters the Chief Information Commission, Uttar Pradesh  Sri Ranjit Singh Pankaj ordered imposition of a penalty of Rs. 25,000 on a senior police officer, IG Karmik in the DGP Office.  The CIC ordered this penalty for alleged intentional denial of information to me despite repeated orders.

Actually I had sought certain information from DGP office about one of my poetry collection by the name “Atmadarsh”. The matter went from the Public Information Officer to the First Appellate Authority to the Information Commission. When the information was not provided, on last date of hearing on 02 April, the CIC issued certain strict directions. 

Today during the course of the hearing, when the CIC found that the required information was not given, instead a reply giving certain alibi for not providing the information was presented, he ordered the imposition of this fine.

What hurts me is the fact that even we, the senior officers in the Government, seem to be violating laws, while we have ourselves been appointed for imposing law in the society. Again it hurts to know that many of the government servants don’t seem to understand the RTI Act and its beneficiary effects. RTI Act is a simple act which has opened the vistas of governance to the common people and we must all honour its dictate instead of sulking over it. We must also understand the nuances of the RTI act in its fullness so as to be of assistance and support to common people.

The moment each government servant understands the fact that he is there to apply and executive laws and are not law unto themselves and they start having healthy attitude towards laws, including the RTI Act, many of the problems being faced by common masses presently will automatically evaporate in a jiffy.

The real Question is- “Will they?”

Amitabh Thakur

Saturday, May 25, 2013

इतनी हिम्मत !



इतनी हिम्मत !
 
मैंने और पत्नी नूतन ने जब इन्फोर्मेशन टेक्नोलोजी  एक्ट 2000  में धारा 79 के तहत बनाए गए 
इन्फोर्मेशन टेक्नोलोजी (इंटरमिडीएरी गाइडलाइन्स) नियमावली 2011 के नियम 11 के अनुसार 
इंटरमिडीएरी द्वारा अपने वेबसाईट पर शिकायत अधिकारी के नाम और उनके संपर्क पते प्रकाशित
 करने के बारे में मई 2012 में इलाहाबाद हाई कोर्ट, लखनऊ बेंच में एक रिट याचिका की थी तो 
हमें नहीं मालूम था कि इस दौरान एक पर एक गंभीर बातें सामने आएँगी.  
 
जो नयी बात हमें देखने को मिली वह थी कि जहाँ भारतीय इन्टरनेट सर्विस प्रोवाइडर देश के क़ानून
 का पालन करते हुए आईटी एक्ट के तहत बने नियम के अनुसार शिकायत अधिकारी नियुक्त कर 
रहे हैं, वहीँ विदेशी प्रोवाइडर इसका पालन नहीं कर रहे हैं. 
 
यह तथ्य स्वयं सचिव, इलेक्ट्रौनिक और सूचना प्रौद्योगिकी विभाग, भारत सरकार द्वारा हमें इस 
विषय में प्रेषित आदेश के साथ संलग्न सूचनाओं के जरिये सामने आये.  


सचिव के आदेश के साथ 29 नवंबर 2012 को सूचना प्रौद्योगिकी मंत्री की अध्यक्षता में हुई बैठक 
का कार्यवृत्त है. इसमें लिखा है कि सभी भारतीय सर्विस प्रोवाइडर आईटी एक्ट से सम्बंधित 
नियमावली का पूरा पालन सुनिश्चित कर चुके हैं और उनके द्वारा शिकायत अधिकारी नियुक्त हो 
चुके हैं, वहीँ विदेशी प्रोवाइडर इसका पालन नहीं कर रहे हैं. 
 
इस बैठक में यह बात आई कि विदेशी सर्विस प्रोवाइडर शिकायत अधिकारी नियुक्त नहीं करने की 
जगह इस कार्य हेतु एक खास ईमेल की व्यवस्था करने की बात करते हैं. पर इसी बैठक की कार्यवृत्त 
में आईटी विभाग के ग्रुप कोऑर्डिनेटर डॉ गुलशन राय के हवाले से यह भी कहा गया है कि इस प्रकार
 से कथित रूप से शिकायती ईमेल वनाये जाने की बात वास्तव में कारगर नहीं होती दिख रही है.
 भारत सरकार ने अंतर्राष्ट्रीय सर्विस प्रोवाइडर ट्विटर को इस प्रकार की एक शिकायत भेजते हुए 
उसे हटाने का निवेदन किया. लेकिन सरकार के आवेदन  के बाद ना ट्विटर की तरफ से ना तो 
कोई प्रतिक्रिया आई और ना ही उस मामले में कोई कार्यवाही ही की गयी. बाद में ट्विटर ने 
स्वीकार किया कि वह सरकार का भेजे ईमेल को खोज पाने में असफल है. 
 
जाहिर है ऐसे शिकायती ईमेल पर आप बार-बार अपनी शिकायत भेजते रहेंगे और कुछ भी निकल 
कर सामने नहीं आने वाला है. 
 
एक उपभोक्ता और सामाजिक रूप से सक्रीय नागरिक के रूप में हमारी मांग और हमारा प्रयास मात्र
 इतना है कि यह वर्तमान स्थिति दूर हो. साथ ही यह भी जान कर अजीब लगता है कि हमारी 
सरकार का सूचना प्रौद्योगिकी विभाग ट्विटर और इस जैसे अन्य व्यावसायिक संगठनों से क़ानून
 का अनुपालन करवा पाने में असफल हो रहा है. मेरी सोच में तो इसमें इन कंपनियों की मनबढ़ई 
नहीं, हमारे क़ानून का पालन कराने की इच्छाशक्ति में कमी है. वर्ना यह संभव है कि कोई विदेशी 
कंपनी देश के क़ानून का उल्लंघन करे और सम्बंधित प्राधिकारी उस पर असहायता प्रकट करें. अरे,
 ये सर्विस प्रोवाइडर कंपनियां इसी देश से करोड़ों कमा रही है, एक बार नियंत्रक प्राधिकारी ठीक से 
आँखें तरेर दे और क़ानून का सख्ती से पालन करने के आदेश दे दो, मजाल है इन कंपनियों की, 
देश के क़ानून और क़ानून का पालन करने वाले प्राधिकारियों के आदेशों का उल्लंघन करें. 
 


How dare one !



How dare one !
 
When I and wife Nutan had filed a Writ Petition in Allahabad High Court, Lucknow Bench in May 2012 as regards section 79 of the IT Act and  Information Technology (Intermediaries guidelines) Rules 2011 where Rule 11 says that the intermediary shall publish on its website the name of the Grievance Officer and his contact details, we never knew there would be so many twists and turns in the sory and so many unknown facts will come in open.
 
The latest fact in our knowledge came through the order of the Secretary of the Electronics and IT 
Department , Government of India. It has an Annexure attached with it which us as regards the 
meeting chaired by IT and Electronics Minister on 29 November 2012.
 
In the minutes of the Meetings at Annexure to the Secretary’s order it is clearly written that all 
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in India have implemented the provisions of the IT Rules and have 
accordingly designated Grievance Officers. But the foreign ISPs are not complying with the provisions 
of the Rules. 
 
In the meeting it also came to fore that while the foreign ISPs say designating Grievance officers is 
not practical and request that a particular email may be notified to enable grievances to be redressed,   
many a times this is also not being followed.
 
The minutes of the meetings talk of Department’s Group Coordinate Dr Gulshan Rai mentioning that 
such a case of designating emails for posting grievances did not work in the recent past. The Government 
posted the grievances and the request for disabling such an information to Twitter. However, there was
 no response from Twitter nor was any action taken on the requests made by the Government. Later it
 was admitted by Twitter that they could not locate the said request made from the Government to the 
designated email account. 
 
As a consumer and as a concerned person of this Nation, our endeavour is only to assist in getting rid of 
this situation. At the same time, it looks rather strange to know that a Government Department could not 
enforce its writ and its own rules, that too from commercial organizations. To me it seems that the reason
 for such a situation is not the company’s extended will but the lack of appropriate will to ensure the law 
of the land. The moment the law enforcing agencies decide not to allow any foreign company to violate 
the laws, no company will dare to do so. These Service Providers are earning crores of rupees from this 
country, they will never try to lose this market. Hence, it is time all the law enforcing agencies understand 
this fact in its totality.

Saturday, May 18, 2013

Government of India order in our Writ Petition for compliance of IT (Intermediaries guidelines) Rules, 2011.




Let us take our laws seriously

Let us take our laws seriously

Rangeya Raghav was a prominent Hindi writer of the 20th century, who started writing at the age of 13 years, and during his short life of almost 40 years, he was endowed with a number of prizes. He was at the same time a novelist, a short story writer, an essayist, a critic, a dramatist, a poet, an historian and a reportage writer. He could possibly do all this in such a short time period because whatever he had to do, it was on his own and it did not involve one or more Government departments. Or otherwise, his situation might have become similar to that of the title of one of his famous novels Kab tak pukaroon (How Long Do I Call).

Rangeya Raghav had to think by himself and had the liberty to express and implement them on his own. Possibly the same would not have been the case with a public office which seem to be having their own methodologies and speed and rules of operation.

This is a fact that every such person who wants to deal with government mechanism and government machinery must learn by heart, more so when the person concerned is apparently involved in transforming the society through the appropriate use of government machinery.

I would try to elucidate this fact in some details through one of my personal experiences. The whole thing started last year when it came to my knowledge that the Information Technology Act related with better and more efficient control of Internet, Cyber world and the Computer world has section 79 in it which is as regards the Service Providers or the Intermediaries.

As per section 79 of the IT Act, Intermediaries, like Google, Yahoo, Facebook, My Space etc are not liable for third party information if they observe due diligence while discharging their duties. To make these provisions more specific, the Government of India through the powers vested in it by the IT Act formed the Information Technology (Intermediaries guidelines) Rules 2011.

Rule 3 of these Rules requires that the intermediary shall publish the rules, terms and conditions not to host or display grossly harmful, harassing, blasphemous defamatory, pornographic, paedophilic information. It also requires that if any an affected person makes a complaint, the Intermediary shall act within thirty six hours to disable such information. Rule 11 says that the intermediary shall publish on its website the name of the Grievance Officer and his contact details.

These rules are extremely useful for the common users. If the service providers make it clear what are the information which they cannot put on the website or transmit, it will act as a barrier for the common users. Similarly, it will be a big relief for Internet users as they will have a ready mechanism to present their grievances and to object to offensive materials which is presently lacking.  

When we made some basic study in this direction, we found that these things are not being followed by the Intermediaries like Google, Yahoo, Facebook, My Space etc. To end this situation, we filed Writ Petition No 3489/2012 in Allahabad High Court, Lucknow Bench in May 2012. The High Court said that this is the age of Internet. Hence all the Rules related with Internet shall be strongly enforced. We argued the case ourselves while Ashok Nigam, Additional Solicitor General opposed the Writ petition saying that they had not made Yahoo, Google etc a party in this petition.

The bench of Justice Devi Prasad Singh and Justice Saeed Uz-zaman Siddiqui did not agree with the arguments of the State counsel and said that if the Government of India has framed any Rules, it shall get it properly enforced. The Court said that the petitioners had sent many representations to the Secretary, Ministry of Information Technology but no action was taken in this regards. Hence, the Court directed that since the matter is of wider public interest hence the Government of India shall ensure within three months that as per Rule 11, all the intermediary publish the name of the Grievance Officer and his contact details on their website.  They also ordered the Secretary, Information Technology to intimate the petitioners about the action taken as regards their representation.

With this order, we had a feeling that the matter would end forever. The Government of India will ensure the compliance of the High Court order and with this some useful work for the common Internet users will get done.

But possibly this was only the beginning. I and Nutan sent a copy of the High Court order to the Government of India. To this the Electronics and IT Department sent us a letter that the order of the High Court had been intimated to all service providers and they had been directed to follow these orders in letter and spirit.

When nothing happened after a lapse of substantial period of time and the service providers did not follow the directions, Nutan filed a Contempt Petition in the High Court. The Court agreed with us only partially saying that since the Government of India had already given directions to the concerned persons to ensure the High Court orders, hence substantial compliance of the order would be presumed. Hence no contempt of the Court has been committed. But at the same time, the Court said that if the petitioner felt that there still remained anything to be done in regards to their original grievances, they may approach the competent forum. 

Since most of the Service providers were still defying the Government rules, hence we filed another Writ Petition No 9359/2012 in the Allahabad High Court, Lucknow Bench. The Court ordered-“This writ petition has been filed on the same cause of action, which was adjudicated earlier and in support whereof Union of India is said to have made a statement to the effect that the order has been complied with.
However, it is also submitted that the statement has not yielded any result.
Thus, we deem it appropriate to dispose of the writ petition with liberty to place it before the Secretary, Department of Electronics and Information Technology, Ministry of Communication and IT, Government of India, CGO Complex, Lodhi Road, New Delhi as a fresh and comprehensive representation on behalf of the petitioner to honour the statement made in the Court. The representation by way of a copy of writ petition shall be disposed of within three months in the light of the aforesaid statement on behalf of Union of India.”

When more than three months passed, Nutan filed the second contempt petition in this case.  The bench of Justice Dr Satish Chandra issued contempt notice against the Electronics and IT Secretary directing him to comply with the order within 10 days. On the next date of hearing, Justice Sudhir Agarwal directed the Secretary to be present in person on the next sate of hearing.

Now we have received an order dated 17 May 2013 from the Electronics and IT Secretary. As per this order, on 12 June 2012 the Government directed all service providers to follow the High Court orders about compliance of Government Rules.
The same directions were issued in the meeting chaired by the Union Minister on 02 August in the light of the High Court order where the Service providers, Civil society members, Industry members etc were invited. I was also one of the invitee in this meeting. Again on 29 November 2012 the meeting of Cyber Regulation Advisory Committee (CRAC) was held under the Minister’s Chairmanship where the High Court orders were also discussed. Many service providers presented their disagreement to Rule 11 saying that there was no concept of Grievance Officer in the international scenario but the Indian Government made it clear to them that they would have to abide by the High Court orders. The Department has also published the two High Court orders on its website.

Thus this order states that the Government has always been extremely alert towards the orders and has never flouted the High Court orders.

But the real issue to be seen in all this hullabaloo, dirt and dint is that even today, after so much efforts on our part and many High Court orders, a great majority of the Service Providers blatantly violate Rules 3 and 11 of the IT Regulations of 2011. This is the question I want to raise- Why is it that there are plethora of laws, Acts and Rules in our country but when it comes to their implementation, many ifs and buts start pouring in. Hence what possibly needs to be done is firstly to scrap all those laws which are either impractical or useless or counterproductive or amend them to that extent, but if there is some law then it must be complied with in its totality. The position- of there being some law and the law not being implemented, cannot be said to be in the interest of the Nation.  It presents the entire Governance in a bad light, as if it stands in utter helplessness, something which many people like us, really dislike.


Amitabh Thakur