What should a PIO do if records are sought for beyond their retention period?
3 Feb, 2013Background
The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Punjab National Bank seeking information on the conversion of fixed deposits (FD) to other accounts and the details about the renewal of a particular FD. The Public Information Officer (PIO) denied for providing information stating that the account number given by the appellant was incomplete.
Proceedings
During the hearing before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the respondent stated that the information in respect of the FD was not available as according to the bank's policy, the records only for past 10 years are maintained whereas the information sought was older and hence unavailable. Regarding the renewal of FD, the respondent explained that there was no application made for renewal of this FD. The respondent also stated that the appellant never sought renewal of the FD and that the appellant is seeking the enhanced interest as an afterthought without having applied for the renewal. The appellant submitted that the information is neither certified nor signed. The respondent explained that this is a computer generated record and hence it is without signatures.
View of CIC
The Commission rejected the appeal stating that the respondent has not contravened the RTI Act and they do not have to do anything further.
Citation: Mr. Arun Kumar v. Punjab National Bank in Decision No. CIC/SM/A/2011/002874/VS/01857
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2013/CIC/1012
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission