State Information Commission to hear a second appeal on Hema Committee report on October 9

A. Abdul Hakeem, State Information Commissioner. File
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

The State Information Commission has scheduled a hearing on a second appeal concerning the Hema Committee report on October 9, said State Information Commissioner A. Abdul Hakeem here on Saturday (October 5, 2024).

Mr. Hakeem said that it was not proper to comment on the matter before the hearing. He was responding to media queries on the possibility of the redacted pages of the Hema Committee getting released along the sidelines of a seminar on Right to Information Act organised at the Ernakulam Press Club in connection with the 60th State meeting of the Kerala Union of Working Journalists that is set to get underway here later this month.

The extraordinary order issued by the SIC directing the release of the redacted Hema Committee report had a paragraph saying that if the parties had any grievance about the implementation of the order, they may approach the Commission. “Grievances, if any, arising from the implementation of the above orders by any of the parties involved in this case may be brought before this Commission, which remains available to adjudicate such matters in accordance with the provisions of the RTI Act,” the order said.

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It was in this context that that the petitioners made a second appeal about some of the pages getting unduly redacted. Usually when the SIC issues an order, the petition stood settled and disposed off.

Mr. Hakeem said that the State Information Commission (SIC) was fully responsible for the committee report not getting released for four-and-a-half years. After the committee said that the report need not be released in the public, there was no way the State government could have released it.

Now it has been released on the direction of the SIC subject to the provisions of the Act that parts revealing the identity of people and which amounted to intruding into privacy be redacted, Mr. Hakeem said.

When asked if the government redacted much more than what was directed, he said that the SIC didn’t hold such an opinion.