The Supreme Court of India had given a historic judgement on the Right to Privacy, including it as a fundamental right of the citizen in the Constitution of India. This judgement was internationally acclaimed and Indians felt they had a system in place which could truly dispense justice of the highest order. There were celebrations across the nation after this judgement. Sadly, however, the same SC while dealing with the Aadhaar matter, just a few months later, completely changed its character. This change was reflected in the making of Aadhaar mandatory both for beneficiaries of government doles as also linking it with PAN, thereby dragging taxpayers into the net. Thus, the only segment of population left out is the one that is most grey – that does not pay tax nor does it avail any government subsidy or dole. After this erroneous judgement, the wheels of governance, now, seem to roll in a completely different direction. Apart from very many small but insidious executive orders, the governments both at the Centre and various states have now started taking steps to curtail liberties of the citizens.
One of the best examples has come to light recently. On 20 December 2018 night, the Union Home Secretary passed an order number SO 6227(E) on the Cyber and Information Security Division granting the authority to 10 official agencies to pry on individual computers and their receipts and transmissions “under powers conferred on it by subsection 1 of section 69 of the Information Technology Act, 2000, (21 of 2000) read with rule 4 of the Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguards for Interception, Monitoring and Decryption of Information) Rules, 2009”, authorising these ‘security and intelligence agencies’ to intercept, monitor and decrypt any “information generated, transmitted, received or stored in any computer resource under the said Act”. This is seen as an extreme measure to deny people their right to privacy. More so because agencies such as Delhi police or CBI and even Directorate of Revenue Intelligence cannot be strictly termed as organizations concerned with homeland security, the main excuse being dished out as the reason of such a directive. This executive order smells of a much deeper game being played out in the twilight days of the 16th Lok Sabha.
Collection of data seems to have become the sole fascination for the government of India today. With an unquenchable thirst for information, this government at the Centre and most governments in the states of India have all set out on a surveillance race. This will be the fastest process to turn India into a police state. While politicians change every five years, the country’s governance system is being left at the mercy of the bureaucrats. It is this class of people that is pushing the police state agenda. This especially becomes easy when the democratically elected leader starts suspecting every other elected member and also the citizens in general. Taking advantage of this mindset of isolation, underlined with extreme greed for power, the bureaucrat seems the most trustworthy and harmless. It is obvious they will not aspire for the ultimate throne that these apex politicians desire, thereby making them out as non adversaries.
A point to note is the rebuttal mouthed by various BJP spokespersons in the media. While justifying the 20 December order, they are claiming that it was a decision of the Congress led UPA way back in 2009 and is now required for the security of the nation. The Congress did not get it implemented. So, the BJP has simply put it to work, they say. This excuse goes for Aadhaar, demonetisation, GST, MGNREGS and most other decisions being implemented by the Modi government. That the idea of demonetisation was also toyed by the UPA government has been publicly admitted by senior RBI officials. Yet, the Congress refrained from implementing most of these governance related toxic ideas. While MGNREGS kind of pro-poor schemes, however bad, were implemented by the Congress, these other projects remaining in the backburner proved that political thinking was stronger in the grand old party than bureaucratic grip.
It needs to be reiterated that in a vastly populated democratic nation like India, the government has to have its ears to the ground. The greed for money and desire for urbanization are something that are born from the womb of bureaucrats. This directly results in neglect of the poor and rural sections of society. When governments ignore rural India, farming is the worst affected. The present desperation of politicians of all hues across India shows how they all, knowingly, neglected the farmer for decades. Now that the farmer has become aware of the powers that work against the interest of farming, the urge to have more information and crush alternative thought is taking hold over the majority of top political rulers. This order of the Union Home Secretary, empowering random agencies to virtually do anything they wish makes it clear that panic has set in.