The Information and Technology Ministry has said that it is taking necessary steps to comply with the orders of Central Information Commissioner (CIC) on 'Aarogya Setu'.
The statement comes after the Ministry and NIC were slammed by the CIC over their reply to an RTI stating that they do not have any information about the “creation” of the Aarogya Setu application promoted by the government to contain the spread of COVID-19.
“As per the orders of the CIC, Central Public Information Officers (CPIOs) of Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY), National E-Governance Division (NeGD) and NIC have been directed to appear on November 24, 2020. MeitY is taking necessary steps to comply with the orders of the CIC,” the IT Ministry said in a statement.
The CIC termed the response as “preposterous” and issued a show-cause notice to the NIC to explain why a penalty under the RTI Act should not be slapped on it for “prima facie obstruction of information and providing an evasive reply”.
“With regard to the above, it is clarified that there should be no doubt with regard to the Aarogya Setu App and its role in helping contain COVID19 Pandemic in India,” MeitY said in a release, adding that, as was announced on April 2, 2020, the Aarogya Setu App had been launched by the Government of India in a public-private partnership mode to bring the people of India together in its fight against COVID-19.
“The names of all those associated with the development of the App and management of the App ecosystem at various stages was shared when the code was released in Open/Public Domain and the same was shared widely in media also...On all such occasions, it has been clearly mentioned that the Aarogya Setu App has been developed by NIC in collaboration with volunteers from Industry and Academia,” it added.
It said that the app had been developed in the most transparent manner, and all details and documents, including the “Privacy Policy” and the “Aarogya Setu Data Access and Knowledge Sharing Protocols” issued on May 11, 2020 had been uploaded on the Aarogya Setu portal.
The App, as per the government, has been downloaded by more than 16.23 crore users. It has helped identify Bluetooth contacts of COVID-19 positive users, and in issuing alerts for helping people to stay safe.
