The watchdogs we can’t trail

Three days ago, four police personnel were arrested in Himachal Pradesh for their suspected collusion with a drug trafficking network. They had intercepted an LSD consignment worth more than Rs 1 crore in Kullu district, but allegedly also assisted two traffickers to run the drug trade unhindered.

Senior police personnel called it a heinous crime involving criminal conspiracy and grave misconduct, implying corruption. Ironically, earlier this month, Himachal Pradesh also issued a notification to exclude the State Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (SV&ACB) from the ambit of the RTI Act under Section 24, which applies only to security and intelligence agencies. Trivia: The notification also spells vigilance as ‘vigilence’!

Established in 2006, the SV&ACB is headed by an officer of the rank of Director General of Police and staffed with 350 personnel. It handles complaints of corruption against bureaucrats and private contractors, economic offences, drug-related crimes, and matters related to loss of forest revenue, wildlife protection and poaching, offences related to motor vehicles, and excise and tender manipulation by officers. It is also tasked with issuing vigilance clearance certificates to officials when required. Intelligence-gathering is incidental to its primary mandate of probing corruption and other specified crimes.

In 2020-21, Himachal Pradesh was ranked first among the northeastern and hill states under the Union Government’s Good Governance Index. In citizen-centric governance, it stood fourth. Given this high rating, its latest move to turn all information about the SV&ACB’s working into sarkari secrets is worrisome.

According to official data, the average number of cases the SV&ACB probed annually, since 2020, has never crossed a hundred. Between April 2008 and March 2021, it received over 3,500 RTI applications, of which barely 6% were rejected. Less than five cases reached the State Information Commission (SIC). More recent data is not available on the SIC’s website. Senior and experienced officers handle RTI matters: a DySP-rank officer is appointed as the Public Information Officer, and a DIG-rank officer is designated as the first appellate authority. The government has not offered any justification for insulating the SV&ACB from the RTI Act, despite this limited workload.

In 2008, under a DMK government, Tamil Nadu became the first to keep its State Vigilance Commission and Directorate of Anti-Corruption out of the RTI Act. In 2014, an NCP-Congress coalition government insulated Maharashtra’s Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB). In Chhattisgarh, a BJP government had done the same for its ACB in 2013. Ten years later, the High Court ruled that under the exceptions to Section 24 of the Act, the ACB is duty-bound to disclose information about allegations of corruption, despite being excluded from the statutory obligations of transparency.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) secured its hall pass from the transparency regime in June 2011, under a UPA government. Afterwards, it resisted the disclosure of any information about the corruption cases it investigates, be it against others or its own officers. Ironically, a month earlier, India had ratified the UN Convention Against Corruption, which requires state parties to collaborate with civil society and citizens to combat corruption.

Five cases were filed in the high courts of Kerala, Bombay, and Delhi seeking a cure for CBI’s allergic reaction to RTI. In 2015, the then Chief Justice of India, H L Dattu, directed the transfer of these cases to the Supreme Court. Ten more persons occupied India’s highest judicial office afterwards and retired, but these cases remain pending. They have not been listed after 2018 because the service of notice has not been completed in one case. The wait for justice is agonisingly long for the citizens, even in matters of enormous public interest.

According to the Central Information Commission’s (CIC) annual reports, the CBI has dealt with more than 25,000 RTI applications between April 2016 and March 2025. From a high of 49%, the proportion of rejection of RTIs has come down to 34% now. Given CBI’s resistance to transparency, this data is intriguing. What kind of information the CBI is disclosing to whom has never been researched.

When there are multiple exemption clauses in the RTI Act to prevent unwarranted transparency from derailing the processes of crime investigation and prosecution, there is no justifiable reason why anti-corruption agencies must be marched out of its coverage. The largest opposition party in Parliament is very vocal against corruption. It can walk the talk in Himachal Pradesh by revoking the notification of the SV&ACB’s exclusion, as it runs the government there.

The writer wakes up every morning thinking someone somewhere is hiding something.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.