The corporate entities could not escape public scrutiny by the media in the free market economy is the important question of law raised by the Chennai Press Club in its petition in the Supreme Court, which has admitted it to allow the club to become a party in the case for probing the leak of Radia tapes by Ratan Tata.
The Chennai Press Club (CPC) in its impleadment petition allowed by a bench of Justices G.S. Singhvi and A.K. Ganguly has sought to draw a clear distinction between the right of privacy of an individual and the corporate enteritis, which virtually had been “influencing” the political decision-making process in certain crucial sectors after the opening of the economy. Since names of certain corporate personalities had surfaced in the tapes, the club submitted that the published transcripts of her conversations, has thrown up a very important question of law “whether corporate entities can claim the same privacy right as of an individual in the peculiar facts and circumstances of the case.” “If the activities of a person, including his conversations related to the public affairs of the state, such person cannot contend that a cloak of secrecy must be maintained around his role,” the CPC said, adding the public interests in openness in democratic society would “outweigh the public interest in privacy”.
As the case involved an important question related to the right of freedom of speech, CPC said those who sought to “interfere” in state matters and “influence” its decision-making process that fall in the exclusive political domain, such entities “cannot contend that a cloak of secrecy be maintained around their roles.”
“They may have a right to privacy in relation to their private lives but not in relation to activities which are wholly political or related to the public affairs of the state,” the CPC asserted.