Appellant: instead of transferring his RTI application to the private banks u/s 6(3) of the RTI Act, RBI simply denied the information claiming that the information sought was not held by them; private banks should be under RTI Act - CIC: denial upheld
13 Jan, 2015ORDER
1. The appellant, Shri Datar Singh, submitted 8 separate RTI applications dated 24 May 2013 before the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO), Reserve Bank of India, Chandigarh; seeking similar information regarding a/c nos. 01625730000259, 01624410008833, 01621930000172, 01621000058354, 01621000147364 (all with HDFC Bank); 016201001505 (ICICI Bank); 100007953665 (INDUSIND Bank) Ltd & 005792000001343 (Yes Bank), through a total of 32 points. 2. Vide reply dated 14 June 2013 & 10 July 2013, CPIO provided information on point nos. 24 & 32 and denied information on point nos. 123 & 2531 on the ground of non availability of information sought. Not satisfied by the CPIO’s reply, the appellant preferred an appeal dated 17 July 2013 to the first appellate authority (FAA). Vide order dated 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. August 2013, FAA upheld the CPIO’s decision and also explained the same.
3. Dissatisfied with the response of the public authority, the appellant preferred appeal before the Commission.
4. The matter was heard by the Commission. The appellant’s representative submitted that the appellant had sought information on 32 counts but did not get satisfactory information from the CPIO concerned. He submitted that his main grievance against the public authority was that, in place of transferring his queries of the RTI application to the public authorities concerned i.e. private banks u/s 6(3) of the RTI Act, 2005; they simply denied the information on the ground that the information sought was not held with them. He also submitted that the private banks should also be declared as public authority as Government nominees are present in the board of these Banks, and the private banks are regulated by Reserve Bank of India. He also added that appellant was the legal heir and successor of Late Shri Avtar Singh and had a court order in his favour.
5. The respondents submitted that the appellant had filed 9 RTI applications seeking similar information with reference to different individual accounts numbers of private banks. Each RTI application consisted of 32 points. They provided information on point nos. 24 & 32 pertaining to the inspection of record and about the name and other particulars of the appellate authority but denied rest of the information on the ground that they were not the custodian of those information, and it was not available with them. They could not transfer the RTI application to the private banks concerned because u/s 6(3) of the RTI Act, RTI application could be transferred from one public authority to another public authority, but in this case the information holders were all private parties and not declared as public authority so far, therefore they were not in a position to transfer the RTI applications to them. They also submitted that the RBI had only limited regulatory powers upon the private banks and they were not involved of the functioning of these banks.
6. The appellant relied on Sections 2(f) “information” means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force; “information” means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force; and (j) of the RTI Act and argued that the terms“ held by or under the control of the public authority” will include information which the public authority is entitled to access under any other law from a private body. As per the Banking Regulation Act, 1949 (the “B.R. Act”), RBI has control and access over the Bank and therefore, information must be provided in relation to his RTI application. The appellant has cited Poorna Prajna Public School v. CIC & Ors. W.P. (C) No. 7265/2007 and submitted that in the said matter, copies of the minutes of the Managing Committee of the School were not available with the Education Department, Government of NCT Delhi. The Commission has held that the public authority can ask for information from the petitioner school and therefore, the PIO should have collected the information with regard to the minutes of the Managing Committee of the School and furnished the same to the applicant.
7. The respondents stated that the RBI had given complete autonomy to the individual Banks to deal with day today banking operations. They submitted that the RBI could only seek reports and returns and other information from the Banks for the purpose of the Banking Regulation Act which empowered it to regulate the Banks when the RBI neither has the desired information in its possession nor can it access such information under the relevant law for the purpose of providing it to the appellant under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, they cannot compel the CPIO to collect this information and provide to him. As suggested by the respondents, in cases where any customer has any grievance against any Bank, he can approach the Banking Ombudsman for redressing his grievance.
8. The FAA has rightly quoted the observation of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of CBSE Vs Aditya Bandopadhyay (Civil Appeal No. 6454 of 2011), which had observed as follows: “35. At this juncture, it is necessary to clear some misconceptions about the RTI Act. The RTI Act provides access to all information that is available and existing. This is clear from a combined reading of section 3 and the definitions of `information' and `right to information' under clauses (f) and (j) of section 2 of the Act. If a public authority has any information in the form of data or analysed data, or abstracts, or statistics, an applicant may access such information, subject to the exemptions in section 8 of the Act. But where the information sought is not a part of the record of a public authority, and where such information is not required to be maintained under any law or the rules or regulations of the public authority, the Act does not cast an obligation upon the public authority, to collect or collate such nonavailable information and then furnish it to an applicant...”
9. In the present matter, the very nature of the information sought by the appellant does not envisage a situation where the respondent public authority must “access the information relating to a private body under any other law for the time being in force” as mentioned in section 2(f) “information” means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force; “information” means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force; of the RTI Act and then furnish the same to the appellant. The Commission also does not find any larger public interest involved in the present matter as argued by the appellant’s representative. Therefore, the Commission upholds the decision of the CPIO. The appeals are disposed of.
(Manjula Prasher)
Information Commissioner
Citation: Shri Datar Singh v. Reserve Bank of India in Appeal: No. CIC/MP/A/2014/000111 CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 25/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 26/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 27/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 28/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/002129/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 31/MP CIC/VS/A/2013/00 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. 32/MP