Business Standard: Ahmedabad: Thursday,
December 08, 2016.
The Gujarat
High Court today issued a notice to the state government on a PIL challenging
the eligibility of a recently-appointed information commissioner.
A division
bench of Chief Justice R Subhash Reddy and Justice V M Pancholi issued notice
to Information Commissioner D P Thakar and the principal secretaries of General
Administration and Legal Departments.
Petitioner
Praful Desai challenged Thakar's appointment saying his educational
qualification and experience did not meet the criteria under the RTI Act.
Thakar's
qualification BCom, LLB was not commensurate with the post, as the Act says
that information commissioner should be a person of eminence, with "wide
experience" in terms of educational qualification, Desai claimed.
Thakar joined
government service as a clerk and was gradually promoted to deputy secretary
before being appointed as an information commissioner, the PIL said.
"The
government of Gujarat has so far murdered, through its repeated acts of
omission and commission, objectives for which RTI Act 2005 was enacted,"
the PIL alleged.
In August
2012, the high court asked the government to fill up two vacancies of
information commissioners. In February 2015, it set aside two appointments of
information commissioner, observing that the persons did not meet the criteria,
the PIL pointed out.
Last
December, the high court again ordered the government to fill up the two
vacancies.
Desai's
earlier PIL on the same issue was dismissed by the court as he failed to obtain
information about Thakar's educational qualification through RTI.
He filed a
fresh plea after obtaining the information through another source.
The PIL also
sought to know how the government was proceeding with appointment of the new
Chief Information Commissioner (CIC). Present CIC, Balwant Sinh, retired on
December 6.
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