Times of India: Rajkot: Friday,
April 25, 2014.
Gujarat high
court has directed the state government to hear the appeal of right to
information (RTI) activist Ramsinh Mori against his externment from five
districts and take a decision on it within three months.
Mori, an RTI
activist from Sutrapada of Gir-Somnath district, who exposed corruption in a
government school, moved the HC after being handed down punishment of
externment by the local authorities.
The HC
refused to intervene in the issue at this stage and advised the petitioner to
avail an alternative remedy. The court also asked the authorities to take a
decision on his appeal within 90 days. Mori has questioned his two-year
externment from five districts and the Union Territory of Diu as ordered by
Veraval's sub-divisional magistrate.
The
externment order that was passed on February 5 accuses Mori of using RTI as a
tool for blackmailing government offices, schools and fair price shops for
personal financial gains. The order also mentions two complaints lodged against
him under Sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 504 (intentional insult with
intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 186 (obstructing public servant in
discharge of public functions) of the IPC.
The order
states that the people are so terrified of him that they refrain from lodging a
complaint. "If such activities continue, they can have serious
implications on law and order in Gir-Somnath district and surrounding areas of
Junagadh," the order reads.
Mori has been
externed from Gir-Somnath, Porbandar, Junagadh, Amreli, Rajkot (urban and
rural) and Diu. After a series of RTI applications filed by Mori last year, the
Junagadh district education officer had found prima facie financial
irregularities in scrap auction and initiated an inquiry against a school
principal Randhir Mori.
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