 "Can the whistle-blower take refuge in law?")
Following the reported leak of internal communications between Essar group employees, which show the company was extending favours to politicians, ministers, bureaucrats and journalists, many are wondering whether the person who blew the lid is covered under the Whistleblowers Protection Act, 2011.
The Act, which received the President's assent on May 9 last year, was "established as a mechanism to receive complaints relating to disclosure on any allegation of corruption or wilful misuse of power or wilful misuse of discretion against any public servant and to inquire or cause an inquiry into such disclosure and to provide adequate safeguards against victimisation of the person making such a complaint and for matters connected therewith and incidental thereto".
To secure protection under the Act, one has to file a complaint with the competent authority - the Central Vigilance Commission in the case of central government employees and the prime minister in the case of Union ministers. For parliamentarians other than those in the council ministers, the Lok Sabha speaker is the competent authority. For state governments, chief ministers and Assembly speakers preside on such matters.
Someone from the private sector can seek recourse in a recent Supreme Court ruling, through which the court indicated disclosure of a whistle-blower's identity wasn't important if the information about an offense or wrongdoing was credible enough to act upon.
Prashant Bhushan, who filed the public interest litigation on behalf of CPIL, had kept the identity of a whistle-blower secret in a case related to former Central Bureau of Investigation director Ranjit Sinha. Now, Bhushan might have to use the same argument in the Essar case. "Not only is he (the whistle-blower) covered under the Whistleblowers Act, he also needs protection from all sorts of harassment," Bhushan told Business Standard.
The Act, which received the President's assent on May 9 last year, was "established as a mechanism to receive complaints relating to disclosure on any allegation of corruption or wilful misuse of power or wilful misuse of discretion against any public servant and to inquire or cause an inquiry into such disclosure and to provide adequate safeguards against victimisation of the person making such a complaint and for matters connected therewith and incidental thereto".
To secure protection under the Act, one has to file a complaint with the competent authority - the Central Vigilance Commission in the case of central government employees and the prime minister in the case of Union ministers. For parliamentarians other than those in the council ministers, the Lok Sabha speaker is the competent authority. For state governments, chief ministers and Assembly speakers preside on such matters.
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In the Essar case, it isn't clear whether the person who provided the information to the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), a non-governmental organisation, is a government employee or not. More, the Act doesn't cover corporate espionage; it deals with corruption in the case of government employees and institutions alone. Government officials have to provide proof of their identity and relevant documents to substantiate their allegations and during the ensuing investigation, they can move the authority concerned for protection.
Someone from the private sector can seek recourse in a recent Supreme Court ruling, through which the court indicated disclosure of a whistle-blower's identity wasn't important if the information about an offense or wrongdoing was credible enough to act upon.
Prashant Bhushan, who filed the public interest litigation on behalf of CPIL, had kept the identity of a whistle-blower secret in a case related to former Central Bureau of Investigation director Ranjit Sinha. Now, Bhushan might have to use the same argument in the Essar case. "Not only is he (the whistle-blower) covered under the Whistleblowers Act, he also needs protection from all sorts of harassment," Bhushan told Business Standard.