Central Information Commission
K. Balu vs Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited ... on 5 June, 2020
Author: Neeraj Kumar Gupta
Bench: Neeraj Kumar Gupta
के य सूचना आयोग
Central Information Commission
बाबा गंगनाथ माग,मु नरका
Baba Gangnath Marg, Munirka
नई द ल , New Delhi - 110067
वतीय अपील सं#या/Second Appeal No. CIC/BHELD/A/2018/637381
K. Balu ... अपीलकता/Appellant
VERSUS
बनाम
CPIO, Bharat Heavy Electricals ...$ तवाद गण /Respondents
Limited, Nodal CPIO, RTI Cell,
BHEL Corporate Office, BHEL
House, Siri Fort, New Delhi -
110049.
Relevant dates emerging from the appeal:
RTI : 26-04-2018 FA : 16-07-2018 SA : 23-12-2018
CPIO : 25-06-2018 FAO : 24-10-2018 Hearing: 29-05-2020
ORDER
1. The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) before the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO), Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, RTI Cell, BHEL Corporate Office, BHEL House, Sirifort, New Delhi seeking information on four points, including, inter-alia:
"(i) The selected 800 candidates for the post of Supervisor Trainees must have been allocated to different BHEL Units according to their requirement.
Kindly provide me the list of candidates allocated to BHEL Units in soft copy;
Page 1 of 5(ii) The BHEL Units must have issued offer letter to these allocated candidates and some candidates may not have joined BHEL for various reasons. Kindly provide me the list of candidates refused BHEL Offer;
(iii) Details of action taken by BHEL Officials including CMD for the applicant's representations dated 03/04/2018 and 09/04/2018; and
(iv) Name and designation of BHEL Official assigned to dispose these representations."
2. As the CPIO had not provided the requested information, the appellant filed the first appeal dated 16.07.2018 requesting that the information should be provided to him. The first appellate authority was ordered on 24.10.2018 and disposed of his first appeal. He filed a second appeal u/Section 19(3) of the RTI Act before the Commission on the ground that information has not been provided to him and requested the Commission to direct the respondent to provide complete and correct information.
Hearing:
3. The appellant attended the hearing through video-call. The respondent, Ms. Arpita Mehta, CPIO attended the hearing through video-call.
4. The respondent submitted their written submissions dated 26.05.2020 and the same has been taken on record.
5. The appellant submitted that complete and correct information has not been provided to him by the respondent on point no. 1 of his RTI application. The appellant further stated that copy of written submissions which was filed by the respondent has not been provided to him. The appellant alleged that there is a corruption in the respondent public authority and that is why they are obstructing the information. The appellant submits that the CPIO's statement that the requested information is available in hard copy is not believable for the reason that the candidates were allowed to submit their application through on-line only. All Page 2 of 5 recruitment activities should have been processed by computers. The CPIO with the intention to deny the requested information had made false statement. The appellant further stated that information should be provided to him free of cost. During the hearing, the appellant had made allegations regarding the conduct of CPIO and FAA.
6. The respondent submitted that the appellant, Sh. K. Balu is a habitual information seeker with BHEL who recurrently files applications before BHEL. He is an ex-employee of our company and is using RTI as a tool to address his grievances against the company. Not only through RTI, the appellant is repetitively, parallelly and frequently invoking other mediums like Grievance redressal system; representations to Directors/CMD/Ministries etc. only with a vexatious motive to torment the Authorities at BHEL. After filing RTIs, as a characteristic, the applicant has been persistently calling the CPIO/Appellate Authority and other officials of BHEL for either threatening or imposing his own belief of the systems in BHEL. The respondent further stated that in this particular RTI application, the appellant has either sought clarifications and proofs further to the reply of the then CPIO /made counter reply to the CPIO's reply or made frivolous accusations doubting the competence of the then CPIO.
7. The respondent further submitted that point wise reply has already been provided to the appellant vide letter dated 25.06.2018. The respondent further submitted that the appellant submitted the RTI Application dated 26.4.2018 at the ids of [email protected] and [email protected]. Post the telephonic reminder of Shri. K. Balu, in the first half of June ,2O18, his RTI Application dated 26.4.2018 has been retrieved from the spam folder. Therefore, there is no malafide intention regarding delay in giving information.
Page 3 of 5Decision:
8. The Commission, after hearing the submissions of both the parties and after perusal of records, observes that the appellant rather than telling about the details of information which has not been provided to him, he has made observations regarding the conduct of CPIO and FAA. From perusal of all the records, the Commission could not find any malafide intention on the part of the CPIO.
9. However, in the interest of justice, the Commission directs the respondent to facilitate inspection of records to the appellant on his RTI application on a mutually convenient time and date and the appellant may take desired documents after inspection of records on payment of requisite photocopy charges. The above directions of the Commission should be complied within a period of 30 working days from the date of receipt of this order.
10. With the above observations, the appeal is disposed of.
11. Copy of the decision be provided free of cost to the parties.
नीरज कुमार ग'ु ता)
Neeraj Kumar Gupta (नीरज ता
सूचना आय(
Information Commissioner (स ु त)
त
दनांक / Date:29-05-2020
Authenticated true copy
(अ)भ$मा+णत स,या पत $ त)
S. C. Sharma (एस. सी. शमा),
Dy. Registrar (उप-पंजीयक),
(011-26105682)
Page 4 of 5
Addresses of the parties:
1. The CPIO,
Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited,
Nodal CPIO, RTI Cell, BHEL Corporate
Office, BHEL House, Siri Fort, New
Delhi - 110049.
2. Mr. K. Balu
Page 5 of 5