The court stressed that citizens have an unquestionable right to access government decisions and policies that affect public life, and said transparency was not optional but a constitutional obligation.
Published Dec 24, 2025 | 8:00 AM ⚊ Updated Dec 24, 2025 | 8:00 AM
The Telangana High Court. (Wikimedia Commons)
Synopsis: The Telangana High Court has ordered the Congress government to immediately place all GOs, circulars and notifications issued in the past two years in the public domain, after an RTI reply showed that it had only uploaded a mere 17 percent of GOs issued in the first 13 months of its tenure.
A month after a Right to Information (RTI) reply revealed that only 17 percent of the 19,064 Government Orders (GOs) issued by the Congress government in Telangana during the first 13 months of its tenure were available in the public domain, the Telangana High Court has directed the government to immediately disclose all such documents.
In an order issued on Tuesday, 23 December, the Court asked the State government to make publicly available all Government Orders, circulars, rules and notifications issued over the past two years of its tenure.
The direction came while hearing a petition filed by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader Errolla Srinivas. A single judge bench comprising Justice Surepalli Nanda stressed that citizens have an unquestionable right to access government decisions and policies that affect public life, and said transparency was not optional but a constitutional obligation.
Former Minister and senior BRS leader T Harish Rao, who had filed the RTI application, described the order as “a slap in the face of the so-called people’s government.”
“It is not enough to merely call yourself a people’s government, Revanth Reddy. Come out and reveal what you have been clandestinely doing under the cover of secret GOs,” Rao said in a statement.
రాష్ట్ర ప్రభుత్వం దాచి పెట్టిన అన్ని జీవోలను నాలుగు వారాల లోపు బహిర్గతం చేయాలని, పబ్లిక్ డొమైన్లో ఉంచాలని హైకోర్టు ఇచ్చిన తీర్పు సోకాల్డ్ ప్రజా ప్రభుత్వానికి చెంపపెట్టు.
ప్రజా ప్రభుత్వం అని చెప్పుకోవడం కాదు రేవంత్ రెడ్డి, చీకటి జీవోల మాటున నువ్వు దొంగచాటుగా ఏం చేస్తున్నావో… pic.twitter.com/3XnsivVQJt
— Harish Rao Thanneeru (@BRSHarish) December 23, 2025
The RTI reply issued on 18 November by the Information Technology, Electronics and Communications (ITE&C) Department revealed that only 3,290 of the 19,064 Government Orders (GOs) issued between 7 December 2023 and 26 January 2025 were uploaded on the government’s website and made accessible to the public.
As many as 15,774 GOs, accounting for nearly 82 percent, were not available online.
A department-wise break-up highlighted the extent of non-disclosure. The Finance Department issued 3,720 GOs during the period, but only 17 were available in the public domain. The General Administration Department issued 2,233 GOs, of which just 89 were uploaded.
The Home Department issued 1,470 GOs, none of which were made available online. The Health, Higher Education and Panchayat Raj departments also showed negligible disclosure, despite issuing hundreds of orders.
In its response, the ITE&C Department stated that the GOIR portal facilitates the online uploading of Government Orders and that login credentials have been provided to all departments.
Uploading of GOs, it said, depends on the nature of the order and is carried out by the respective departments, with the ITE&C Department acting only as a facilitator.
Harish Rao accused the Congress government of running a “drama of transparency” while systematically keeping government decisions away from public scrutiny.
“The Congress came to power in the name of people’s governance, but has been indulging in the practice of hiding GOs. This will now stand exposed through the Public Interest Litigation filed in the High Court by our senior leader Errolla Srinivas, based on RTI replies,” he said.
Rao demanded answers for withholding such a large number of Government Orders.
“If 15,774 GOs were kept under wraps in just one year, what exactly is the government doing?” he said, asking Chief Minister Revanth Reddy if this was what he called a “people’s government.”
(Edited by Dese Gowda)
