New Delhi, March 17: You would imagine them tiptoeing across foreign alleyways, casting nervous glances over their shoulder as they head for a clandestine meeting with an “asset” to receive a secret document.

But if India’s top administrative tribunal is to be believed, the 007s of the country’s spy agency might as well do it all in the glare of TV cameras.

“The anonymity of personnel of R&AW (Research and Analysis Wing) is more a myth than reality…. There can be nothing gained by asking the officers of RAW to keep to their shells,” the Central Administrative Tribunal ruled yesterday, adding that the veil of secrecy expected of RAW officials was “rather childish”.

It ordered the reinstatement of a woman RAW director sacked for “outing” herself — exposing her identity in public — by attempting suicide outside the Prime Minister’s Office.

Nisha Priya Bhatia, who is in her late 40s, had created a media sensation by swallowing rat poison outside the PMO in August 2008 after being refused entry to voice her charge of sexual harassment against a colleague.

She was compulsorily retired last December 18, the order issued by the cabinet secretary citing Rule 135 (1)(a) of the R&AW (Recruitment, Cadre & Service) to say that any official exposed as an intelligence officer could be compulsorily retired as having become unemployable for security reasons.

The RAW counsel told the tribunal that “the competent authority, the PM, had decided to retire her from service” but tribunal judge M. Ramachandran retorted that the Prime Minister would have acted on “the report submitted by you”.

There is nothing secret about RAW, the tribunal said, advising the agency to “update” its approach “in tune with (the) change in times”.

“The RTI Act has percolated to every nook and corner of government activities and it may be difficult to accept… now that RAW is shrouded in rigid secrecy,” Ramachandran ruled.

The ruling appeared to make no distinction between the agency’s covert operatives and those in desk jobs. It said: “After 10-12 years of assignments around the world, any persons, whether an Indian or a foreigner, if interested in intelligence work, (will) come to know who is who….”

A RAW source said the agency might challenge the order in the high court.

Former Intelligence Bureau (IB) joint director Malay Krishna Dhar said he disagreed with the tribunal that secrecy in intelligence agencies is a myth. “It’s gospel truth and no myth. How they operate, how they raise agents are no matter for public consumption,” he said.

“However, going to court over a grievance against your superiors does not amount to security violation. She hasn’t exposed any security operations… but she would have done well to avoid the media hype. But it’s also true that pictures of many IB and RAW officials have appeared in the media.”

Bhatia claimed she had been targeted for her efforts to expose sexual exploitation of women employees in RAW.

“I had objected to the prostitution rackets running from my office premises, safe houses through use of secret service funds. My seniors wished me to be part of these,” she said.

The RAW counsel said Bhatia had publicly attempted suicide a second time in November 2009 at the tribunal building and got her pictures “splashed all over (the media)”. He added: “In 2009, she had torn off her clothes in the Supreme Court premises.”

External intelligence officials are by convention expected to guard their identity. When Valerie Palme, a covert operative of US spy agency CIA, was outed by a journalist apparently following a leak from within the George Bush administration, she had to resign.

An investigation followed allegations that the White House had targeted her because her husband, a former ambassador, had claimed Washington had hyped the case for the Iraq war. It led to the conviction of Lewis “Scooter” Libby, chief of staff to Vice-President Dick Cheney, for perjury.