Albert Einstein was once credited with saying, “The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.”

As far as India is concerned, whether it is the public or corporate private sector, it is whistle-blowers and RTI activists who have contributed the most to exposing large-scale corruption. Lack of strong protection mechanisms and a loophole-free law to protect whistle-blowers harms all citizens, the economy and the environment.

Whistle blowing:- In defining who a whistle-blower is, the law goes beyond government officials who expose corruption they come across in the course of their work. It includes any other person or non-governmental organisation. The importance of such progressive expansion is underlined by the fact that in the last few years, more than 65 people have been killed for exposing corruption in the government on the basis of information they obtained under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.

Need for strong whistleblower protection act:- A strong whistle-blower protection law in India would expose financial corruption in a way that reinforces ethical business practices. Whistle-blower protection laws incentivise integrity to help detect and deter unethical business practices and fraud. This type of law has been very successful elsewhere. These laws place pressure on companies that are engaged in unethical practices to respect the law, commit to compliance, and not retaliate against whistle-blowers.

After all, it is better to prevent violations than to penalise after the act. The case against Ranbaxy marked the triumph of Dinesh Thakur, who tapped into United States’ whistle-blower protection laws that incentivise and protect people who expose unethical business practices. The False Claims Act, a federal law in the US, provides private individuals protection and incentives to expose fraud. The law has helped the US recoup billions of dollars lost to fraud and corruption while protecting the identity of the whistleblower. India can take inspiration from this. The murder of several whistle-blowers in recent years makes it necessary to protect the whistleblowers In 2003, Satyendra Dubey was killed for exposing financial irregularities in the Golden Quadrilateral highway construction project in Bihar.

The government should welcome whistleblowers, be their advocate, and use their unique status as insiders to guarantee the integrity of social programmes. How does a strong whistleblower act compliment RTI:- The RTI law has empowered the common man to have access to information from public authorities which only government officials were earlier privy to making every citizen a potential whistle-blower. It helps in better governance with better transparency and accountability . Both the acts when complemented bring the irregularities in the government system to the public domain.