Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Aug 17: State Information Commission has imposed penalty of Rs 17250 on Section Officer of State Vigilance Commission, Syed Altaf, who had denied information to the applicant sought under Right to Information Act.
According to the brief history of the case, Pradeep Kumar Sharma, a resident of the State while invoking his right to information conferred on him under Section 3 read with Section 6 of the J&K RTI Act, 2009 filed an RTI application before PIO, J&K Services Selection Board, Jammu on February 24, 2014, seeking certain information as listed in the application.
The PIO, JKSSRB, Divisional Office Jammu, Shamim Kriapak while invoking Section 5(4)(5) sought assistance from Syed Altaf, the then APIO, JKSSRB vide letter dated March 1, 2014. However, Syed Altaf didn’t ensure that the information is given to the information seeker despite the fact that any officer/ official whose assistance is sought under Section 5(4)(5) is under obligation to render all his assistance to the PIO seeking his or her assistance.
Keeping in view Syed Altaf’s conduct, State Information Commission vide its two notices followed by reminder asked for reply from the deemed PIO before taking action as warranted under law. Syed Altaf, the then APIO, JKSSRB, in response to these communications of the Commission, sent his reply on June 15, 2015 admitting that he had received communication from the PIO for providing him assistance.
The only defence of Syed Altaf was that he marked communication to his concerned Record Keeper and in the month of June 2014 he was transferred to J&K State Vigilance Commission.
“From the reply of the deemed PIO, it is quite clear that he had not given serious thought and consideration to the provisions of the J&K State RTI Act, 2009 contained in Section 5(4)(5) read with Section 17. These provisions of law make it quite clear that it’s the personal responsibility of the PIO or deemed PIO to ensure that the response to the RTI application is made within prescribed time and duty is cast on PIO or deemed PIO individually and not on his sub-ordinate staff”, the Chief Information Commissioner, G R Sufi observed.
“It is quite clear that before his transfer from SSRB, Syed Altaf has failed to ensure that he gets the relevant file and forward information to the PIO so that same could be provided to the information seeker”, CIC observed.
Taking all these facts on record, Commission said, “it is quite clear that information has been denied without any reasonable cause”. Accordingly, the Commission in view of the provisions under the RTI Act has imposed penalty of Rs 17250 on Syed Altaf, the then APIO J&K Service Selection Board and presently Section Officer in the State Vigilance Commission.
The CIC has directed the Drawing and Disbursing Officer, State Vigilance Commission to ensure deduction of amount from the salary of Syed Altaf in three installments with effect from August and remit the amount into the Government Treasury.
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