Is PIO obliged to provide voluminous information under RTI?
18 Nov, 2012Background
The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India seeking information regarding advertisements inserted by the company during the period 2006 – 07 to 2010 – 11 along with list of agents, agency code and address who did not complete minimum business of Rs. 1 lakh. The Public Information Officer (PIO) provided the information for four years in respect of the advertisements released by the Company and the name of the agency through which the advertisements was released along with the amount of expenditure incurred on the same. The respondent informed the appellant that for the year 2006 – 07 this information was not traceable. He also provided the total number of agents who were not able to complete minimum business of Rs. 1 lakh was provided but denied their names and addresses stating that this information was voluminous.
Proceeding
During the hearing before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the respondent submitted that they had put in efforts to trace out the information pertaining to advertisements released during the years 2006 – 07 but the same was not traceable and perhaps no advertisements may have been released during that year.
View of CIC
The Commission directed the PIO to put in additional effort to trace out the information pertaining to advertisements released during 2006 – 07 and provide it to the appellant. The Commission however, upheld the order of the PIO in denying the names and addresses of l the over 7000 agents who did not complete minimum business of Rs. 1 lakh.
Citation: Mr. Bhagat Singh Sharma v. LIC of India in Appeal: No. CIC/DS/A/2012/000637
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2012/CIC/804
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission