Supreme Court judges, especially Chief Justices, are fond of proudly stating that their court is the most powerful court in the world. True. But what they do not tell their own citizens is that it is also the most unaccountable and nontransparent court in modern legal history.

An example of how judicial power without accountability and transparency can be maintained is now provided by the Right To Information draft bill drawn up by the Press Council of India under the Chairmanship of former Supreme Court judge P B Sawant. The bill has been circulated in the Mediascape 1997 magazine of the national Media Centre.

The bill, sent to the Union Government for consideration becomes important in the context of Prime Minister Gujral's repetitive promise of transparency. What good is the promise if in terms of the bill, the most powerful limb of national governance, the judiciary, finds no mention in the bill?

The bill in Section 3 declares that every citizen shall have a right to information from a public authority. Any information which cannot be denied by a public authority to a State Legislature or Parliament shall not be denied to any citizen, states the proviso to Section 4 relating to restrictions on the right to information. The ``right to information'' is defined as the right of access to information and includes the inspection, taking notes and extracts and obtaining certified copies of documents or records of any public authority.

The information must be given by the public authority within thirty days of an application. Where the information sought relates to life and liberty it must be given within forty eight hours by the authority. The proposed bill does not declare anywhere that failure to provide the information sought would be an offence. But under Section 8, fines are provided for failure to give the information and an ``offence'' under the Act is made cognisable by Section 10. The word ``offence'' is used only in relation to companies under Section 9.

This is probably the first law that will make an offence cognisable even though it is punishable only by a fine and not by any jail sentence. Thus while the punishment is soft for violating the right to information -- Rs 50 per day for delay and Rs 15,000 for giving false information or failure to give information the police force is let loose to arrest without any prior permission from a magistrate, those allegedly violating the right.

Worse, this does not get the citizen the information in any event. For that he must get involved in the usual litigation in the district courts by appealing against the refusal to a civil judge. The fundamental right of the citizen to know under the Constitution gets defeated in terms of money, time and a war of nerves with the police and the appeal upon appeal from the civil court upwards.

But the worst part is that public authority is defined in such a manner that a citizen has no remedy against the most powerful legal instrument of correction, the judiciary.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.