Why are the erstwhile RTI campaigners so alarmed five years after it became law? Why so many dharnas, rallies, conventions and hunger-strikes all over again? Part of the reason is that the silent revolution that the RTI has spawned needs to be defended from surreptitious alterations and manipulations, and partly because the RTI activists are being threatened, harassed and assaulted by the corrupt and the powerful, often with the connivance...

The CBI should be taken out of the purview of the Right to Information Act (RTI) to block information requests that could put lives of investigators at risk, solicitor general, Gopal Subramanium has advised the government. Subramanium has recommended that the CBI be exempted in light of the "complex and dangerous situations in which the Central Bureau of Investigation has to work". "Its officers need to be protected from dangers which...

The city crime branch on Friday filed a voluminous supplementary chargesheet in the RTI activist Amit Jethava murder case. The report was filed after the arrest of the sixth accused Shailesh Pandya, who is a sharpshooter. One Bahadursinh Rathod, who is believed to have helped the accused persons in carrying out illegal mining activities in the prohibited Gir sanctuary, has been shown as an absconder in the chargesheet. The investigating agency...

The chairman of the National Council for Teacher Education, a statutory body monitoring teachers’ education in the country, has been found guilty of corruption by a vigilance inquiry, sources said. M.A. Siddiqui is likely to be issued a chargesheet within a week. A professor from Jamia Millia Islamia University on deputation to NCTE since 2008, Siddiqui is also likely to be repatriated to the university after it wrote to the human...

The Centre is mulling summary dismissal of public servants chargesheeted for corruption. The move will ensure that government will not have to wait for long-drawn court battle to sack officials found guilty of corruption. But it is to be seen if such a provision will extend to politicians who are classified as "public servants" in the anti-graft law. A GoM on tackling corruption will take a call on the issue while hammering...