{"id":5620,"date":"2017-08-01T20:55:31","date_gmt":"2017-08-01T15:25:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=5620"},"modified":"2017-08-12T00:20:20","modified_gmt":"2017-08-11T18:50:20","slug":"looming-threat-in-blowing-the-whistle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/looming-threat-in-blowing-the-whistle\/","title":{"rendered":"Looming threat in blowing the whistle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><u>Context:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The proposed amendments to the <strong>Whistle Blowers Act<\/strong> contradict the very purpose of the Act.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>Whistle Blowers Protection Act:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Whistle Blowers Protection Act, 2011 is an Act in the Parliament of India which provides a mechanism to investigate alleged corruption and misuse of power by public servants and also protect anyone who exposes alleged wrongdoing in government bodies, projects and offices.<\/li>\n<li>The wrongdoing might take the form of fraud, corruption or mismanagement.<\/li>\n<li>The Act will also ensure punishment for false or frivolous complaints.<\/li>\n<li>The Act was approved by the\u00a0Cabinet of India\u00a0as part of a drive to eliminate corruption in the country&#8217;s bureaucracy\u00a0and passed by the\u00a0Lok Sabha\u00a0on 27 December 2011. The Bill was passed by\u00a0Rajya Sabha on 21 February 2014 and received the\u00a0President&#8217;s\u00a0assent on 9 May 2014.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>Key features:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The Act aims to protect people who bring to the notice of the authorities concerned allegations of corruption, misuse of power or commission of a criminal offence against a public servant.<\/li>\n<li>Every complaint has to include the identity of the complainant.<\/li>\n<li>The Vigilance Commission shall not disclose the identity of the complainant except to the head of the department if he deems it necessary.<\/li>\n<li>The Act penalizes any person who has disclosed the identity of the complainant.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>Need for amendments:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The act covers only central government employees; it does not include state government \/ private bodies.<\/li>\n<li>Whistleblowers commonly face retribution in different ways like, harassment, termination, blacklisting, threats and even physical violence. For instance:<\/li>\n<li>Many\u00a0Right to Information Act\u00a0(RTI) activists, including policemen, have been harassed and even murdered for seeking information to promote transparency and accountability in the working of every public authority in\u00a0India.<\/li>\n<li>Many face assaults on a regular basis. People seeking information from their\u00a0gram panchayat\u00a0and the local administration also face social ostracism.<\/li>\n<li>The law lacks specific criminal penalties for these types of physical attacks on whistleblowers\u2014and given the number of violent attacks on complainants in the past, this is not a minor concern.<\/li>\n<li>Most notably, there is penalty of up to two years imprisonment and a fine of up to 20,000 rupees for individuals that bring false or frivolous complaints.<\/li>\n<li>There is also a 7-year time limit to bring complaints, dating from the time the alleged corrupt practices occurred.<\/li>\n<li>Countries like the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada define \u201cdisclosure\u201d and \u201cvictimization\u201d broadly for purposes of their respective whistleblower protection laws; India\u2019s law does not define \u201cvictimization\u201d and has a relatively narrow definition for \u201cdisclosure.\u201d This again limits the effectiveness of any complainant safeguards.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>Whistleblower Protection Act (Amendment) Bill, 2015:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>In 2015, the government had introduced a bill in the parliament to amend the 2011 act. The key criticisms of this bill are as follows:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Whistleblowers should not be allowed to reveal any documents classified under the\u00a0<em>Official Secrets Act of 1923<\/em>, even if the purpose is to disclose acts of corruption, misuse of power or criminal activities.<\/li>\n<li>It also puts a restriction on disclosure of any information that could prejudicially affect the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India and good relations with foreign State.<\/li>\n<li>The bill puts bars on the activity of whistle blowing in such a way that only some information obtained through RTI etc. has been kept in its ambit.<\/li>\n<li>The bill says that the whistleblowers would be entitled to official protection only if these conditions are met; and they could face action if they are not.<\/li>\n<li>The bill has come under heavy criticism from RTI activists and anti-corruption crusaders.<\/li>\n<li>They are of the opinion that the bill has created huge area of exceptions and due to which the state authorities would be out of reach of whistleblowers.<\/li>\n<li>They also claim that the proposed amendments were drafted without any kind of public consultation and participation.<\/li>\n<li>The amendment Bill seeks to remove immunity provided to whistle-blowers from prosecution under the draconian Official Secrets Act (OSA) for disclosures made under the Whistleblower Protection law.<\/li>\n<li>The basic purpose of the WBP Act is to encourage people to report wrongdoing. If whistle-blowers are prosecuted for disclosing information as part of their complaints and not granted immunity from the OSA, the very purpose of the law would be defeated.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><em>The amendment bill in the light of Right to Information Act:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>To bring the Whistle Blowers Protection Act in line with the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the amendment Bill says that, complaints by whistle-blowers containing information which would prejudicially affect the sovereignty, integrity, security or economic interests of the state shall not be inquired into.<\/li>\n<li>In addition, certain categories of information cannot form a part of the disclosure made by a whistle-blower, unless the information has been obtained under the RTI Act.<\/li>\n<li>This includes what relates to commercial confidence, trade secrets which would harm the competitive position of a third party, and information held in a fiduciary capacity.<\/li>\n<li>The amendments ignore the fact that the two laws have completely different objectives. The RTI Act seeks to provide information to people, while the WBP Act provides a mechanism for disclosures to be made to competent authorities within the government to enable inquiry into allegations of corruption and provide protection to whistle-blowers.<\/li>\n<li>Combining the two laws is inappropriate and would prevent genuine whistle-blowing in several scenarios.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>Way Ahead:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Effective protection of whistleblowers will support an open enterprise culture where employees not only have confidence in reporting but are also aware of the reporting procedures.<\/li>\n<li>An effective Whistle Blowing Policy will facilitate a transparency among employees.<\/li>\n<li>The people must be made aware about the act and its usage.<\/li>\n<li>Educating people is necessary so that they can understand the benefits of disclosing the wrongdoings.<\/li>\n<li>Incorporating state government \/ private bodies will widen the scope of anti-corruption.<\/li>\n<li>Florida, Hawaii, Minnesota and several other states have considered both public and private sector employers, to be included under the whistleblower\u2019s protection acts.<\/li>\n<li>Individual\u2019s identity shall not be disclosed at any cost until unless they give their consent on it or it is required in the public interest. Such a mechanism will help to ensure robust protection to whistleblowers identity.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Context: The proposed amendments to the Whistle Blowers Act contradict the very purpose of the Act. Whistle Blowers Protection Act: Whistle Blowers Protection Act, 2011 is an Act in the Parliament of India which provides a mechanism to investigate alleged corruption and misuse of power by public servants and also protect anyone who exposes alleged&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/looming-threat-in-blowing-the-whistle\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Looming threat in blowing the whistle<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":5627,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bills-policies","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/whistleblowers-3.jpg?fit=1000%2C509&ssl=1","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1700938707},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}