Central Information Commission
Mr.Sharad Phadke vs Indian Overseas Bank on 18 June, 2012
CENTRAL INFORMATION COMMISSION
Club Building (Near Post Office)
Old JNU Campus, New Delhi - 110067
Tel: +91-11-26161796
Decision No. CIC/SG/A/2012/001279/19282
Appeal No. CIC/SG/A/2012/001279
Relevant Facts emerging from the Appeal
Appellant : Mr. Sharad S. Phadke
9A/1, Paschima Nagari,
Near City Pride, Karve Nagar,
Pune 411052.
Respondent : Mr. V. C. Ramchandran
CPIO & Dy. General Manager
Law Department,
Indian Overseas Bank,
763, Anna Salai,
Chennai 600002
RTI application filed on : 21/09/2011
PIO replied : 24/11/2011
First appeal filed on : 24/12/2011
First Appellate Authority order : 23/01/2012
Second Appeal received on : 20/04/2012
Information Sought:
1. Details of all the failed transactions in Overseas Bank ATM from 1 st July 2009 to 31st March 2010 with
following detail of each transaction :
• Date of complaint.
• Complaint Number
• Branch Code of the origin branch of complainant
• Date on which complaint is resolved.
• Any compensation paid to the complainant.
Reply of the Public Information Officer (PIO):
Information soughtwas given to the applicant in the form of soft copy in a CD.
Grounds for the First Appeal:
Incomplete and unsatisfactory information provided by the PIO.
Order of the First Appellate Authority (FAA):
7. The original application of the Appellant, the reply from CPIO and the Appeal petition are carefully examined.
8. It is observed CPIO has supplied the Appellant with the information available with the custodian in the form ordinarily exists which contains more than 65534 entries on ATM failed transactions of the entire Bank for the available period with details namely Date of complaint, Complaint Number, Name of Bank with Branch Code, Date of resolution and Quarterly compensation made.
9.A Public Authority not being expected to acreate and generate afresh information" where none exists, Thecause it is sought by an appellant". Where the information already exists in the form sought for and the issue is simply compiling it to provide an applicant, it is quite clearly the responsibility of CPIO who is expected to collate the existing information and provide it to the applicant, in the form ordinarily to be provided in which it is sought. Therefore securing, Compilation of such voluminous details on ATM transactions either for the period which is not available or held in possession or purged for few details which are not available or held in possession for the purpose of providing such details would disproportionately divert the resources of the authority and therefore exempted for disclosure Page 1 of 2 under Section 7(9) of RTI Act and does not fall under the definition of 'Information' under Sec 2(f) or 2(j) of RTI Act.
Order of the Appellate A uthoritv: -
The Appellant is supplied with the voluminous Information on ATM failed transaction details of more than ATM(on site and offsite) for the entire Bank for the available period with the details with ordinarily exists in the form after collating the details branchwlse which contains around 65535 entries. In view of this, CPIO is not expected create the information on failed ATM transactions for the period which Is either not available and held in possession or for the data which were not being posted/recorded, by securing, Compilation of such voluminous details on ATM transactions. Such exercise would disproportionately divert the resources of the authorities and beyond the scope and duties of CPIO.
AC CPIO has supplied all the information available with him. As the CPIO is not expected to create new data, this application is rejected from the desk of FAA.
Grounds for the Second Appeal:
As per circular dated 17/07/2009 from RBI has to be maintained since it is mandatory on Bank to pay penalty of Rs. 100/- per day if there is a delay over 12 working days. Since this is the essence of the record for this rule Bank has to keep the record of each and every "ATM failed transaction" Whatever bank has written either on a book or on computer is a record as per the definition of Section 2 of the RTI Act. Hence FAA's objection under Section 2 (f) and
(j) are simply laughable. This is the record of the Bank and under the Right to Information Act Section 3 the CPIO has to give it.
All this information is centrally available on all India basis in there ATM resolution center. All this information is computerised and hence the question of Section 7(9) of the Act does not arise. The CPIO has just to pick up the information from computer and past in Excel work book. There are over 2300 branches of the Bank and CPIO has provided only information for 1700+ branches. This means CPIO has provided incomplete information. Bank's ATM management is centralized for entire country, as some banks have, then CPIO could have summoned majority of requested information from such a centralized center with one email only.
Relevant Facts emerging during Hearing:
The following were present Appellant: Mr. Sharad S. Phadke on video conference from NIC-Pune Studio; Respondent: Mr. V. C. Ramchandran, CPIO & Dy. General Manager and Mr. A. K. Mohanthy, Chief Manager on video conference from NIC-Chennai Studio;
The PIO has given most of the information to the appellant but part of the information ahs not been provided to the appellant since the respondent states that the system is not able to retrieve it and this would require manually going through the various entries. The Commission asked the PIO if he would be willing to allow the appellant to inspect the raw data since the PIO has stated that the computer system is not able to get the data which the appellant seeks. The PIO has stated that he would prefer to look at the entries and provide the data manually and he will provide authenticated information to the appellant before 15 July 2012 Decision:
The Appeal is allowed.
The PIO is directed to provide the information as directed above to the Appellant before 15 July 2012.
This decision is announced in open chamber.
Notice of this decision be given free of cost to the parties.
Any information in compliance with this Order will be provided free of cost as per Section 7(6) of RTI Act.
Shailesh Gandhi Information Commissioner 18 June 2012 (In any correspondence on this decision, mention the complete decision number.)(NA) Page 2 of 2