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A group of 95 retired civil servants and diplomats has urged the Union government to roll back Section 44(3) of the 2023 Digital Personal Data Protection Act, which amends the Right to Information Act to bar the disclosure of public officials’ personal information.

In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, the Constitutional Conduct Group said the amendment would render the RTI Act “largely ineffective”. The group warned it would cripple Section 8(1)(j) of the Act by imposing a blanket ban without defining “personal information”, eroding the public interest clause.

Section 8(1)(j) bars disclosure of personal information unless it serves a larger public interest or relates to public activity and its release does not cause an unwarranted invasion of privacy. The group argued that the RTI Act already protects privacy adequately and the amendment undermines citizens’ right to hold officials accountable. Read on.

The Union government has denied receiving a video report by anthropologist Vishvajit Pandya that documented opposition from the Indigenous Shompen and Nicobarese communities to the Great Nicobar Island Development Project. Responding to MP Saket Gokhale in Parliament, the tribal affairs ministry claimed no record of the report, though it was prepared at the Andaman and Nicobar administration’s request as part of project assessments.

Scroll had reported on the Union government’s inaction on Pandya’s report in January.

The Rs 72,000-crore project includes a trans-shipment port, airport, power plant, township and tourism infrastructure. The film featured Shompen and Nicobarese persons voicing concerns about damage to their forests, water sources and kinship networks. Pandya said the report was ignored and never acknowledged. Former minister Jairam Ramesh had also flagged the video to the Centre.

Gokhale also asked whether the ministry had acted on a November 2022 letter from the Tribal Council of Great Nicobar withdrawing its no-objection certificate for the project, but the government did not reply to the question. Read on.

Interview: Releasing Nicobar report would be like ‘opening can of worms’, says anthropologist

Five hundred and forty-nine Indians forced to work at cyber-scam call centres on the Myanmar-Thailand border were repatriated on Monday and Tuesday via Indian Air Force flights, the Ministry of External Affairs has said. The first group of 283 arrived from Mae Sot, Thailand, on Monday, followed by 266 more on Tuesday.

“The Government of India has been making sustained efforts to secure the release and repatriation of Indian nationals lured to various Southeast Asian countries, including Myanmar, with fake job offers,” the ministry said.

A third flight is expected on Wednesday. Thai authorities recently cracked down on these centres, which are part of a network run by Chinese crime syndicates that lure victims through fraudulent employment offers. Returnees said they feared detention abroad. Indian agencies are investigating human trafficking rackets that are fuelling a rise in cybercrime and in nearby South East Asian countries. Read on.

The scammers who got scammed: How jobless Indians were lured into cyber slavery

The Delhi High Court has directed Google, Meta and X to take down a video by YouTuber Shyam Meera Singh that allegedly defames Isha Foundation and its founder Jaggi Vasudev. The video, titled Sadhguru EXPOSED: What’s happening in Jaggi Vasudev’s Ashram, was uploaded on February 24 and shared on social media, alleging exploitation of minors at the spiritual leader’s ashram.

Acting on a defamation suit filed by the foundation, the court also restrained Singh from republishing or disseminating the content. Isha Foundation said the video was “false and malicious”, timed deliberately to coincide with Maha Shivratri celebrations attended by Home Minister Amit Shah.

The court will hear the interim plea in May and the main suit in July. Singh faces a similar suit from Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who was sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment in 2017 for raping two of his women disciples at the Dera headquarters in Haryana’s Sirsa district. Read on.

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