Calcutta, Sept. 12: Calcutta High Court today restrained the state government and the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation from making public the agreement signed with Tata Motors on the Singur project.
“The stay will be operative for 15 days and the case will come up for hearing on September 19,” Justice Dipankar Dutta said in an interim order on a Tata Motors petition.
The company demanded the stay after the WBIDC posted the text of the agreement on its website on a direction from the state information commission, which had received a Right to Information (RTI) Act plea for such disclosure.
Section 11(1) of the act, however, says that when a third party — other than the RTI petitioner and the government — is involved, a submission from it is needed before any information can be revealed, said legal expert Satadal Chatterjee, who specialises on the RTI Act.
The legal action by the Tatas, the third party in this instance, suggests they were not consulted before the text was made public. There was, however, no confirmation from either side.
Tata Motors lawyer Samaraditya Pal argued before the court that the state information commission had violated the RTI Act by asking the state to display the agreement.
“According to the act, my client has the right to keep the agreement secret because it is related with its trade,” Pal said. Other than the state information commissioner, the state government and the WBIDC have been made respondents in the case.
Pal said: “The agreement was signed on March 9, 2007. It was decided the copy of the agreement would not be made public. But the state information commission, in an order dated September 8, asked the government to display the agreement.”
The court asked the lawyer what good it would do to have the text withdrawn now, since it had already been on display. Pal replied that the WBIDC had not displayed the “secret part” of the agreement yet.
“But it is our apprehension that this part of the agreement will be displayed, too.”
Industries secretary Sabyasachi Sen said he was not aware of the court order.
The government had read out the agreement to a House standing committee on August 27. Industries minister Nirupam Sen had then said a copy could not be handed over without the Tatas’ consent.
“According to the RTI Act, a document where a third party is involved can’t be made public without their consent,” Sen had said.
The RTI petition was moved by Amitava Chowdhury, a Calcutta resident.(END) Source: The Telegraph
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