Times of India: Mumbai: Wednesday, June 07, 2017.
The Bombay
high court on Tuesday said it would hear submissions of state Chief Information
Commission (CIC) on a plea by the government challenging its order. The state
has moved the HC to challenge a state CIC order that had in 2014 directed the
government to carry out an inquiry under a commission of inquiry against former
Mumbai police chief Rakesh Maria in connection with alleged discrepancies in
call records of the 26/11 attack.
Government
pleader Abhinandan Vagyani contended before a bench of Justices Naresh Patil
and Bharati Dangre that it was challenging also findings of the CIC that
information was incomplete, misleading or missing in response to a query under
Right to Information (RTI) Act by Vinita Kamte, the widow of additional
commissioner of police Ashok Kamte who was killed during the2008 terror attack
on Mumbai.
Vagyani said
the state was challenging two aspects of the CIC order and said that the
information commissioner has no power to order for an inquiry under the
commission of inquiry act as well as the findings that information was
misleading or incomplete. He argued that the HC cannot go into the facts to see
whether the information provided was incomplete and that the CIC order must be
set aside completely.
The HC said
it would hear the matter on merits on June 15 and asked the state pleader to
inform the CIC which is a respondent in the petition about it.
Kamte had
sought call data records of the police control room on the night of November
26, 2008 when 10 gunmen entered Mumbai and attacked its major landmarks killing
over 160.
According to
Vinita, the information given to her by the police was fake and did not match
the original call data records submitted by the police before the court which
conducted trial in the 26/11 case.
"The
commissioner's office should be apprised of such a petition. We must hear their
side also while deciding this petition," Justice Patil said and posted the
petition for further hearing on June 15.
"At the
most, the commissioner can only impose penalty or hold some officer responsible
for not providing information to the applicant," Vagyani said.
Maria was
then joint commissioner of police (crime branch).
Kamte had
under RTI sought call logs of wireless conversations between the control room
and Kamte's van in which he was killed along with Maharashtra ATS chief Hemant
Karkare and encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar.
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