Information relating to constitution of committees to look into complaints of corruption
13 Feb, 2013Background
The appellant had filed several complaints with the Geological Survey of India (GSI) regarding widespread corruption in the Western Regional Office of the GSI. Later he filed two applications under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the GSI seeking information relating to the constitution of certain committees by the authorities to look into his complaints and the action taken on a large number of complaints he had sent The Public Information Officer (PIO) did not respond.
View of CIC
The Central Information Commission (CIC) observed that the appellant has some grievance against the authorities in the matter of promotion and has been making relentless complaints followed by serial RTI applications. The CIC also observed that all his RTI applications seem to be falling in deaf ear as the PIO concerned seems not to be responding to him at all or with any credible and complete information which shows the organisation in extremely poor light. The CIC directed the authorities in the GSI to take note of the prevailing situation. The Commission further directed the PIO to provide the desired information in both the cases including the copies of the relevant file noting from the files in which his various complaints had been processed. The Commission also directed to disclose the copy of the entire file in which various committees had been set up to look into his case including the reports furnished by those committees. Under section 20 of the RTI Act, the Commission issued a show cause notice to the PIO to show cause why penalty should not be imposed on him for the lapse.
Citation: Mr. Sanmati Kumar Jain v. Geological Survey of India in File No. CIC/SS/A/2012/001100SM & CIC/SS/A/2012/000414SM
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2013/CIC/1043
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission