Information regarding autonomous bodies under administrative control of Ministry of Finance
21 May, 2012Background
The appellant sought information regarding legal nonentities working as autonomous bodies under administrative control of Ministry of Finance. He sought for the list of all such organisation, measures initiated by Ministry to ensure that unregistered and unregulated legal non entities like India's General Insurers Public Sector Association (GIPSA) do not become a forum of Tax embezzlement and Tax evasion, details of visit of officials of GIPSA to Ministry’s Office and the Officials of Ministry to GIPSA’s office. He also wanted a copy of the emails issued by Insurance Division Officials in consideration of RTI application /appeals filed by him. The Public Information Officer (PIO) did not provide the information on the grounds that the queries in the RTI application were vague in nature. Later the respondent stated that list of such organisations and the Officer’s visit details were not maintained by them and therefore could not be furnished to the appellant.
View of CIC
The Central Information Commission (CIC) noted that the matter pertaining to whether GIPSA was a public authority or not, was pending before the High Court. The Commission directed the appellant to provide a copy of the email letter written by the former Joint Secretary with reference to the RTI application to the PIO and the respondent to provide the information after ascertaining the information held by the Department. The Commission also instructed the appellant to desist from using the inappropriate language while exercising the right given to him under the transparency legislation.
Citation: Mr. Gopal Soni v. Department of Financial Services in Appeal: No. CIC/DS/A/2011/001688
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2012/CIC/312
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission