Scientist arrested after causing ruckus over RTI papers

A scientist sacked from the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) was arrested for abusing and threatening the staff at the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) over documents that he had sought under the RTI.

K Dhananjay joined the IIA’s head office in Koramangala in 2003 but was sacked in 2018 after he accused his seniors of misappropriating funds to the tune of Rs 2,000 crore. Before the dismissal, he was suspended for 15 months over dereliction of duty.

Dhananjay is presently fighting a legal battle against his seniors. He approached the CAT and filed several RTI applications with both IIA and CAT to learn about the progress of the investigation.

A Thomeena, 59, a deputy registrar at CAT, Visvesvaraya Kendriya Bhawan, told the police that the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) had directed her office to provide some documents to Dhananjay under the RTI.

On July 24, Dhananjay was informed that he could come and collect the documents. Dhananjay arrived at the CAT office in Halasuru around 3 pm and checked the documents given to him. But he wanted some more documents and got into an argument with the staff. The CAT staff denied that he needed to be given any more documents. A heated exchanged ensued.

Dhananjay allegedly abused three staff members, Rajashree, Rekhashree and Geeta, and reportedly threatened them with dire consequences.

Taking notice of the incident, the deputy registrar filed a complaint with the Halasuru police.

Police said they had registered an FIR under IPC sections 353 (obstructing public servants from discharging their duties) and 506 (criminal intimidation).