Are documents relating to lease and renewal of license liable to be disclosed under RTI?
31 Dec, 2012Background
The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Delhi Police seeking information on several queries pertaining to Amusement Park cum Swimming Pool. The Public Information Officer (PIO) denied the information relating to lease and renewal of license under section 8(1)(d) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information including commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property, the disclosure of which would harm the competitive position of a third party, unless the competent authority is satisfied that larger public interest warrants the disclosure of such information; Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information including commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property, the disclosure of which would harm the competitive position of a third party, unless the competent authority is satisfied that larger public interest warrants the disclosure of such information; of the RTI Act stating that this is personal and trade information. For rest of the information the PIO asked the appellant to deposit a fee of Rs. 42/- for information consisting of 21 pages. The appellant remitted Rs. 50/- towards the fee for supply of 21 pages of information. The PIO vide provided requisite copies of the documents to the appellant. The First Appellate Authority (FAA) upheld the PIO’s decision and noted that the PIO took 29 days to send the reply of RTI application and another 13 days for providing the copies of documents after receipt of the fee, which is correct as per the provisions of the RTI Act.
Proceeding
During the hearing before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the appellant submitted that the PIO took 42 days to supply the information; therefore, the fee deposited should be refunded.
View of CIC
The Commission observed that the information relating to lease and renewal of license attracts the provisions of section 8(1)(d) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information including commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property, the disclosure of which would harm the competitive position of a third party, unless the competent authority is satisfied that larger public interest warrants the disclosure of such information; Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information including commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property, the disclosure of which would harm the competitive position of a third party, unless the competent authority is satisfied that larger public interest warrants the disclosure of such information; of the RTI Act and the appellant has not established any larger public interest for the disclosure of these documents. The commission rejected the appeal observing that the PIO has provided the documents within reasonable period and the question of refund of extra fee does not arise.
Comment
The PIO is obliged to respond to the RTI application within 30 days of receipt of the application. However the intervening period between the intimation of deposition of further fee and actual deposition of further fee is excluded from the time frame of 30 days.
Citation: Mr. Dharam Singh v. Delhi Police in Case No. CIC/SS/A/2012/000064
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2012/CIC/921
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