Legally
India: New Delhi: Thursday, 18 December 2014.
Legally India
yesterday made an appeal under the Right to Information (RTI) Act against
Friday’s (12 December) decision by the BCI chairman to retract the BCI’s reply
to an RTI request to inspect its meeting minutes.
BCI
co-chairman Manan Kumar Mishra had said the BCI would not allow copying of all
the promised documents because he feared Legally India would “create mischief”,
despite having invited Legally India to its offices in an RTI response to
inspect the requested documents.
BCI secretary
and internal RTI appellate authority Jogi Ram Sharma and Mishra had told
Legally India on Friday that the BCI would send a second written reply to the
RTI within several days with formal, written reasons for rejecting Legally
India’s RTI request, besides Mishra’s statement.
However, with
the statutory period for an appeal running out on 19 December, Legally India
sent the appeal by post to the BCI yesterday [see full copy of appeal below].
Sharma told
Legally India by telephone today that he would reply to the appeal directly.
At least two
advocates have submitted or will submit copies of Legally India’s original RTI
request with the BCI.
One advocate
posted a copy yesterday, while another advocate, Dushyant Arora, said that he
would file a request by this evening.
Update
17:56: A total of three advocates have now filed RTIs.
Requests
to other advocates;
If you are a
lawyer and care about transparency in your elected, statutory and representative
body, or if you are a journalist or anyone else who cares, please help.
Print out the
document that is linked to here, amend it as you wish or seem fit, or just
enter your name, address and date, and include Rs 10 as a postal order, DD or
court fee stamp in the envelope, to cover the fees under the RTI Act.
Let us know
once you’ve filed it, at news@legallyindia.com and let us know whether you
receive a reply in 30 days. We’ll keep your identity confidential if you like.