RTI is being misused in the name of public interest: Bhardwaj

The Right To Information (RTI) Act is being "misused" in many cases under the garb of seeking information for public interest, Law minister H R Bhardwaj said. Speaking at the inauguration of a two-day All India Conference of the Central Administrative Tribunal in New Delhi on Saturday, the Minister said, "the Right to Information has still not settled and it is being misused in many cases and there are characters who are not interested in RTI getting into it." "But slowly this law will get settled. It would get over the teething problems and this law will also be strengthened," Bhardwaj said. Praising the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) for disposing of over five lakh cases since its inception, the Minister said almost all tribunals are doing a good job. All those matters that can be sent to tribunals without compromising on the quality of justice should be encouraged to be sent to them. Bhardwaj, however, cautioned that creation tribunal or enactment of laws like RTI alone would not ensure justice, especially for government employees. "Unless there is a desire and an instinct to give justice to your own subordinates it will not happen. So far as grievance is concerned, it should be resolved within the head of the department or the Ministry. There will be lesser litigation if we do that and the government is committed to it," he said. Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan welcomed the initiatives in the field of service jurisprudence, including the CAT experiment. "It is in the interest of state to address the grievances of the employees so that they can effectively serve the general populace," he said. The CJI cautioned against the government's tendency to challenge CAT's orders in courts. "The problem is a large number of CAT decisions are challenged in courts. This is not a good thing. I see in large number of cases the government also challenges the decision of the administrative tribunal. "They should feel these are specialised tribunals and they should end the litigation in the tribunals so that when there are some sorts of settlement that judges have given to the parties, the government should feel that matter should end there." "In a series of matters, I have seen the government challenges the order of the CAT," said the CJI. While the law Minister had earlier praised the work being done by tribunals, the CJI described the creation of a several tribunals as an indication of "tribunalisation." "Tribunalisation is all over the country. There is a serious problem of tribunalisation, especially, in matters in which rights of private parties are involved." In such cases, the rights that were hitherto determined by the court is taken away and is dealt with by an allegedly expert body, he said. Chief Justice Balakrishnan also raised the question of appointment of members of tribunals, especially, the CAT. He pointed to the Law Commission's report which suggested the members should be selected through competitive exams. He also suggested that young candidates instead of retired judges or soon-to-retire judges should be recruited to CAT. These members could be elevated to high courts later. Pointing to the workload of courts, the CJI even suggested that there could be a specialised tribunal for dealing with cases of cheque-bounce. If we can have tribunals for so many things, we can have one for dealing with such cases, he said.

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