Central Information Commission
Mr. Aloke Tikku vs Department Of Personnel And Training on 21 December, 2012
Central Information Commission, New Delhi
File No.CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982
Right to Information Act2005Under Section (19)
Date of hearing : 21 December 2012
Date of decision : 21 December 2012
Name of the Appellant : Shri Aloke Tikku,
145, National Media Centre,
Gurgaon, Haryana - 122 002.
Name of the Public Authority : CPIO, Department of Personnel and
Training, North Block,
New Delhi.
The Appellant was present in person.
On behalf of the Respondent, the following were present:
(i) Shri R.K. Girdhar, US,
(ii) Smt. Anuradha S. Chagti, Director
Chief Information Commissioner : Shri Satyananda Mishra
2. Both the parties were present during the hearing. We heard their submissions.
3. In two separate RTI applications, the Appellant had sought a number of information mainly relating to the amendment to the RTI Act and Rules respectively. In response to both these RTI applications, the CPIO had observed that the desired information was contained in files which had been put CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982 up to higher authorities and would be disclosed only after receiving those files back. The Appellate Authority had endorsed the stand taken by the CPIO.
4. The Appellant argued that the response of the CPIO was not acceptable because it was not in conformity with the provisions of the Right to Information (RTI) Act. The information could not be denied, he argued, merely because the file was under submission to some higher authority. In the present case, he submitted that the submission of the file to the Prime Minister (PM) meant that it was within the Department of Personnel and Training, the PM being the Minister in charge, and, therefore, the relevant files were available within the Department. He pointed out that he had received similar replies from the CPIO of the DoPT in the past also which showed that this was one way of not giving the information to information seekers.
5. The Respondents submitted that the relevant files had been indeed put up to the higher authorities including the Prime Minister and, therefore, were not physically available in the section. After carefully considering both the submissions, we are of the view that there must be a better way of dealing with such situations where the desired information forms part of a live file in the process of decisionmaking. The twin objectives of meeting the information need of the citizen and early decision making by the authorities, a balance has to be struck. In cases like the present ones, the CPIO should have estimated the likely time to be taken in the disposal of the files by the higher authorities and informed the Appellant appropriately. However, if it was not possible for the CPIO to find out about the likely time to be taken, he should have informed the higher authorities about the RTI application and the need to provide the information within a period of 30 days. In that case, the onus of deciding CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982 whether to return the files temporarily to meet the demand of the information seeker would have been on the higher authorities themselves. In the present case, the CPIO chose the simple alternative of informing the Appellant that the files were under submission to higher authorities. The fact that the relevant files were within the Department was ignored. We would like the CPIO to bear this in mind in future and whenever a similar case comes up, he must intimate the higher authorities to whom the relevant files have been submitted to take a call and either return the files or provide the information themselves directly to the information seeker. It must not be forgotten that as far as the information seeker is concerned, he does not distinguish between one or the other authority within the public authority itself; for him the CPIO is the single point of contact. Therefore, it is for the CPIO to facilitate the disclosure of information even if he has to summon the files from the higher authorities only for this purpose.
6. The Appellant submitted that while he understood that the relevant files had been under submission to the higher authorities at the time of the RTI applications, he expected that the CPIO should have provided the desired information once the files returned to the respective divisions. According to his information, the relevant files must have come back to the respective divisions way back in July this year whereas the information was provided only recently. It is to be remembered that the CPIO had himself promised to provide the information once the files were received back. By not providing the information soon after receiving the files back from the higher authorities, the CPIO has rendered himself liable for imposition of penalty as per the provisions of subsection 1 of section 20 of the Right to Information (RTI) Act. Both the CPIO and the Appellate Authority concerned, present during the hearing, submitted CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982 that this happened because of oversight caused by excessive workload and extremely poor infrastructure. They submitted that the CPIO's work load was huge with nearly 400 RTI applications received till the end of November this year and numerous RTI related court cases and schemes and programmes. The number of personnel posted to assist the CPIO and the Appellate Authority is too small to cope with such workload. While accepting this explanation as plausible enough not to impose any penalty on the CPIO, we would like very strongly to urge the Secretary of the Department of Personnel and Training to review the working of the CPIO and to provide additional manpower and other resources so that he can fulfil his statutory responsibility of providing information within the stipulated period.
7. As long as the Right to Information (RTI) Act is on the statute book, it is our responsibility to see that its mandates are carried out faithfully and without any lapse. In fact, there is a need to review why such large number of RTI applications are being preferred to this particular CPIO. In our view, it should be possible to minimise the number of RTI applications by uploading most of the information held in this particular division in the website of the Department on a continual basis. For example, the files relating to the appointment of the CIC/Information Commissioners, amendment to the RTI Act and Rules, staff strength and other infrastructure facilities for the CIC are most often demanded by the citizens. To begin with, the department can decide to upload all these files in their website since, in our opinion, there could be very little in these files which would come under any of the exemption provisions. We direct the CPIO to obtain the orders of the competent authority within the department and carry out the uploading within a month of receiving this order. This option would be CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982 far more economical than employing larger number of personnel to assist the CPIO.
8. We direct that the CPIO must put up this order before the Secretary of the Department of Personnel and Training immediately on receipt. We would like a report on the steps being taken by the Department to improve the working of the CPIO and the Appellate Authority within two months. We dispose of the appeals accordingly.
9. Copies of this order be given free of cost to the parties.
(Satyananda Mishra) Chief Information Commissioner Authenticated true copy. Additional copies of orders shall be supplied against application and payment of the charges prescribed under the Act to the CPIO of this Commission.
(Vijay Bhalla) Deputy Registrar CIC/SM/A/2012/000981 & 982