At a preliminary hearing of the marriage equality petitions in March, Solicitor General of India (SG) Tushar Mehta told the Supreme Court that there is “no stigma” about the LGBTQIA+ community after the 2018 Navtej Singh Johar judgement that decriminalised Section 377. The Solicitor General’s grandstanding is surprising since the Union government has not abided by the court’s order that said the judgment should be given publicity.
A series of RTI applications by Akhilesh Godi, one of the petitioners in the Navtej Singh case, has revealed that no action has been taken in this regard and that at least five ministries, including the Law Ministry, which was one of the respondents in the case, has categorically stated that they are not the ones responsible for doing the publicity.
Justice RF Nariman, in the Navtej Singh Johar vs Union of India judgement, passed an order directing the Union government to take measures to publicise the judgement. "Union of India shall take all measures to ensure that this judgment is given wide publicity through the public media, which includes television, radio, print and online media at regular intervals, and initiate programs to reduce and finally eliminate the stigma associated with such persons. Above all, all government officials, including and in particular police officials, and other officers of the Union of India and the States, be given periodic sensitization and awareness training of the plight of such persons in the light of the observations contained in this judgment.," he said in the judgement.
In 2021, Akhilesh filed an RTI application with the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB), Ministry of Law and Justice, Ministry of Home Affairs, and Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment asking about the status of the implementation of the order. “The I&B Ministry replied saying that there was no information available with them and that some of the RTIs were transferred to Prasar Bharati, Doordarshan, Press Council and Central Bureau of Communication,” Akhilesh said.
Prasar Bharati, in its response, said that it did not receive any instruction about this. “The Prasar Bharati has not apparently received any instructions from the Department of Legal Affairs. Moreover, the direction is to the Union of India in the Ministry of Law and Justice. It is for the Ministry to give effect to the directions of the court, including publicity through media like television radio, print, and online media. Hence, no information is available in Prasar Bharati,” read the response.
Following this response, Akhilesh filed a fresh application to the Law Ministry with a fresh set of questions. After receiving no response from the Ministry, he filed an appeal in September 2021, for which he again received no response, and he filed a second appeal before the Chief Information Commission (CIC) in March 2022. This was heard on March 15, 2023.
During the hearing, Akhilesh pointed out that the Law Ministry stated the files pertaining to his RTI application “were missing” and “untraceable”. The Ministry had also claimed that a response was given to the petitioner in a similar RTI with the same questions. “Further, it was also submitted that it was not the subject matter of the Department of Legal Affairs despite them being the main respondent in the case,” Akhilesh said.
After going through multiple RTI applications and appeals, he said that little has been done to give effect to the orders passed by the court.