Kerala High Court extends government’s undertaking on achievement messages till March 2

Kochi: The Kerala High Court on Friday extended till March 2, the earlier undertaking given by the state government that no messages highlighting the achievements of the state government will be disseminated.

With the direction, Justice Bechu Kurian Thomas listed the matter for further consideration on Monday, March 2.

While agreeing with the extension of its undertaking, the government lawyers said it would be applicable only to the data received from Service and Payroll Administrative Repository for Kerala (SPARK) and not any other source.

The submission was made after the lawyer for the petitioners -- Dr Rasheed Ahammed, an associate professor at a college in Malappuram, and Anil Kumar K M, a clerical assistant at the Secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram -- filed in court additional documents related to data received from KSMART (Kerala Solutions for Managing Administrative Reformation and Transformation) system.

On Tuesday, the court had observed that the emails and messages allegedly sent by the CMO to officials highlighting the achievements of the state government constituted an intrusion of privacy.

The petitioners, in their plea, have claimed that sending such messages amounts to an election campaign.

The state government had earlier told the court that the messages were not sent by the CMO.

The government lawyer said that the messages were disbursed by the data principal which in this case was the Kerala State Information Technology Mission.

The petitioners claim to be aggrieved by a bulk messaging campaign from the Chief Minister's Office (CMO), allegedly targeting state government employees and others receiving salaries and benefits under various schemes on the eve of the Assembly elections.

According to them, the messages were sent by accessing private data provided for intimating the credit of monthly salary and benefits.

"This is nothing but an election campaign, resulting in intrusion into the right to privacy of citizens by the state without their consent, by accessing the private data of government employees and others who have given their details for crediting their monthly salary in SPARK," their petition has claimed.

SPARK is an e-governance initiative under the Finance Department of Kerala and operational since 2007, aimed at digitalising HR-related services and salary data of government employees.

The petitioners have also sought a declaration that procurement of personal data of government officials by the CMO and its use for disseminating such messages is violative of the right to privacy guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.