Hyderabad High Court okays survey after Telangana says it’s voluntary
KCR said citizens have the liberty to refuse to divulge details
By : DC Correspondent
Update: 2014-08-15 01:34 GMT
Hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court on Thursday gave its nod to the Telangana government to conduct its intensive household survey in the state on August 19 after the government confirmed that it was voluntary and there is no element of compulsion.
While refusing to stay the survey, Justice Vilas Afzulpurkar said that the government would have to strictly adhere to the statement made before the court that disclosure of information was only on voluntary basis.
The judge admitted petitions by an advocate Seetha Lakshmi, and Mr Rajasekhar Tulasi challenging the decision to hold the survey.
Advocate-general K. Ramakrishna Reddy explaining the stand of the government in conducting the survey and the intentions behind it and added that it was voluntary and no one would be pressurised to participate.
Mr Reddy added that the motto behind the survey was to extend government welfare schemes to the downtrodden classes of the state and also to weed out bogus white ration cards wherein underserved persons were benefitting from schemes like Arogyasri and free rice and housing for poor.
He said that citizens were at liberty to refuse to divulge details of bank accounts and income tax and they could also refuse to participate in the survey altogether.
Meanwhile, the judge dismisses the petition. Advocate-general K. Ramakrishna Reddy pointed out that this was not the first time that the government was seeking information from the citizens; in 1995, 2001 and 2011 the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh government had also sought details from citizens for extending welfare schemes to the needy.
Senior counsel R. Raghunandan Rao, appearing for the petitioner, said that seeking information of bank accounts, income tax was nothing but invading the personal life of citizens. He said if the citizens divulged these information there was every possibility of it being posting on public domain, which could be accessible to other departments.
He contended that Parliament had already enacted the Collection of Statistics Act, 2008, and the Collection of Statistics Rules, 2011, and as per the Act a nodal officer was to be appointed. When a department in a state government wishes to collect statistics, it is required to first consult the nodal officer after which a notification is to be issued with a gap of at least 15 days between the notification and the communication of advice.
Reacting to the submissions, the judge asked the advocate-general whether it was mandatory to disclose the details of bank accounts and income tax particulars in the survey to which the latter said that it was purely voluntary.
The judge dismissed the interim application of the petitioner to stay the survey after recording the statement and pointing out that the government should instruct the enumerators to strictly adhere to the submissions made before the court.
The judge said, “As the AG stated that the disclosure of information is only on voluntary basis and there is no compulsion, as such that the question of infringement of rights to privacy of any citizen does not arise. In my view, that primary contentions of the petitioner are prima facie not satisfied.”
While admitting the main petition challenging the validity of the survey, the judge issued a notice to the government for filing of counter affidavit and adjourned the case to August 20.