RTI: Token penalty of Re 1 slapped on passport office by CIC

New Delhi (PTI): In a rare decision, the CIC has slapped a token penalty of rupee one on Ghaziabad passport office for harassing an RTI applicant.

RTI applicant, Commodore Lokesh Batra, himself sought imposition of the token penalty over the Re one on the passport office after it failed to respond to his query related to facilities for the disabled at the office.

"The appellant brought to the notice of the Commission the harassment that he has had to go through to get his demand for fulfilment of an important section of the RTI Act to be implemented.

"The commission considers his point of view and, as per the his own request, awards a token compensation of Re 1 for the mental harassment that the appellant has faced," said Central Information Commissioner O P Kejariwal.

In his RTI application in July 2006, Batra had sought information on the implementation of section 4 of the RTI Act related to facilities for the disabled at the Regional Passport Office at Ghaziabad. He wanted to "know the status of the action taken...under Chapter II of the RTI Act."

When the office did not give any reply within the stipulated one-month time, Batra filed an appeal in the department and then approached the CIC in March 2007.
Token penalty of Re 1 slapped on passport office by CIC

Comments
Under the RTI Act it is mandatory to impose penalty @ Rs 250/- per day of delay. So in all cases where such penalty is NOT imposed we can logically presume that the information commissioners have taken bribes and defaulted on their mandatory duty. There are canards being spread that the RTI Act is being misused by the public. We need to counter this too. Anybody who can read and has not lost his common sense can understand that the ONLY people who can misuse the RTI Act are the information commissioners. It is ONLY they who can FAIL to impose mandatory penalties by taking bribes from the PIOs. For example, in a case where the PIO is required to be fined Rs 25000/- (and mind you in all cases that reaches the IC the upper limit of penalty would have been reached!) he/she can easily take a bribe of Rs 15000/- and FAIL to impose the penalty. So both the IC and the PIO are gainers. And who is hte loser? The public! Please spread this message to all activists. We need to expose the ICs and shame them as much as possible.

Maj PM Ravindran

An award of any penalty can have its effect visualised by the Architects of the Right to Information Act 2005 only if it affect the delinquent. Apart from the monetary drain, it should have a deterrant effect lest such offence is repeated. Intention of the Appellant seeking to limit the amount of fine to Re.1/- could be that the appellant may not be needing from the PIO any compensation for the injuries inflicted on him by the PIO but defenitely want the PIO to suffer the deterrant effect of such penalty. The Appellant did not achieve his aim by curtailing the compensation to Re.1/-. Compensation is not a penalty to be impossed on the PIO by the Commission under Section 20(1) or 19(8)(c) of the Act. It is more or less the pnalty impossed by the Commission requiring the public authority to compensate the complainant for any loss or other detriment suferred. The Act does not say that such amount of compensation should be recovered from the PIO. This amount has to be paid by the public authority to the Appellant from the public fund. This expenditure become "a loss due tomisappropriate, fraud or neglect" This means that the amount so paid has to be realised from the person responsible for this or tobw written off by the competent financial authority. Various limits of financial powers are laid down to write off such loss also. In case of writing of loss due to fraud, neglect etc, the permissible limit is too meagre or even higher officials. This means the public authority has to approacxh the higher authorities in case the intention is to write of such compensation.One has to approach higher the authorities higher the amount to be written off. The procedure envisaged being too long I am not attempting to narrate it here. In short if the intention of the appellant was to cause a deterrant on PIO the compensation amount should have been higher enough compelling the public authority to approach higher authorities or resorting to departmental action to realise the loss from the PIO. For writing off Re.1/- the lower level head of office is fully compentent.
By seeking to limit the compensation to Re.1/- the Appellant did not achieve anything, no punishment to PIOP, or AA or anyone. The amount can be written off by a lowest official. No record of this offence in the service records of the PIO. In fact the Appellant has made a MOCKERY of the RTI Act.

Col R Kurup (Retd)