Appeals against SIC orders: The State Information Commission’s order has been upheld only in one out of the 84 appeals filed in the last decade by agencies whose documents were sought to be made public.
A query under the Right to Information (RTI ) Act has revealed that of the 84 appeals filed in the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court between 2006 and so far in 2015, the SIC order was upheld only in one case.
RTI Activist Galgali had made the plea to find out what happens to orders once passed by the information chief for disclosure of documents. “Appeals against replies filed by the SIC have resulted in low success rate for the Commission in the last 10 years,” Galgali told ToI. Most matters went to the HC, while three are pending in the Supreme Court.
The agencies, which approached the Courts against SIC’s orders included the state home department, Mumbai University, Reliance Energy, BMC, and police department, said the activist.
Galgali had filed an RTI query with the Maharashtra State Information Commission seeking information about the cases in which agencies had gone to Court against orders seeking disclosure of documents or information. The SIC refused the information on the grounds that there was no such data available with it. The shocking reply prompted Galgali to file an appeal under RTI. Following his appeal, the SIC informed him that between 2006 and 2015, 84 cases went to Court and the SIC’s order was upheld only in one case. The other 83 either had the SIC order overturned or the matters are still pending.
Galgali said his query also revealed that in many cases, the SIC appeared not to take “much interest” in the court cases. So, the SIC’s orders were not properly defended.
Inspection of documents:
In a progressive move, Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta has issued a circular on the implementation of the Right to Information Act that aims at reducing red tape in the civic body.
The circular points out that citizens applying for information under the RTI Act are often summoned by civic officials to inspect documents, even when they have not asked for an inspection or when the information they have asked for is not voluminous. The circular has discouraged the practice, and has asked public information officers (PIOs) to supply copies of documents after counting the number of pages requested and charging the applicant per page.
“In cases where the applicant has applied for inspection of the documents or the information he has requested is voluminous, an index of all the documents should be prepared before he is called for an inspection. Each page in the file must be numbered. Three dates & timings should be intimated to the applicant before he is called. If these dates are not convenient to the applicant, he should be asked to get in touch with the PIO” says the circular.
