‘Seeking legal opinion over summoning Facebook before Goa house privilege panel’

Panaji, Dec 18 (IANS) The Goa assembly's privileges committee on Monday resolved to take legal opinion on whether Facebook officials can be summoned in connection with a probe involving a government officer, accused of breaching privilege, by allegedly uploading a photo of an assembly question on the social media site.

"Kashinath Shetye has denied that he has published anything on Facebook. It looks like his account was hacked. His photograph was there and whatever was posted was before the committee. Through his account, he has made an allegation on (BJP member Nilesh) Cabral and all those things. We are examining that and he has said, that the accusation should be made on Facebook. We are going to look at it," said Deputy Speaker Michael Lobo.

Asked if Facebook officials would be summoned by the privileges committee in connection with the probe, he said: "We are taking legal opinion on this. We are not targeting anybody."

In August, during the assembly's monsoon session, Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar informed the House that four separate probes had been initiated into the activities of Shetye, a junior engineer in the Electricity Department and a prolific RTI activist, who over the last five years has filed as many as 195 cases, most of them against government agencies, vis a vis illegalities and environment rule violation issues.

A privilege motion was also moved by Cabral, who accused the RTI activist of uploading his question on Facebook, before it was tabled in the state assembly, claiming the information was stolen from the assembly premises and was a violation of his privilege as an MLA.