Anju Agnihotri Chaba; Indian Express: Fri Nov 12 2010,
Jalandhar : Shiromani Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) has been served a legal notice for not providing information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act for nearly six months regarding expenditure done on the centenary celebrations of Baba Banda Singh Bahadur at Mata Gujri College in Fatehgarh Sahib in May this year.
The petitioner Balwant Singh Khera is National Vice-President of Socialist Janta Party and also the Chairman of Malta Boat Tragedy Probe Commission.
Khera told The Indian Express that he had applied to SGPC under RTI to get details of the expenditure on the event. But on May 26, SGPC replied that the case regarding the event was pending in the Punjab and Haryana High Court and no information regarding the expenditure could be provided.
Khera said, as per his knowledge, an amount of Rs 58 lakh was spent on the pandal (marquee) alone while 1,200 buses were arranged to carry the people and a series of advertisements regarding the event was published in various national English and language papers. “We also asked for details of various other miscellaneous expenditures, as crores of rupees were spent on this event,” he said.
Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal and BJP National President Nitin Gadkari spoke from the religious stage regarding their political issues during the event, said Khera.
Khera’s advocate Jatinderjit Kaur, in the legal notice, mentioned that she had gone through the entire writ of the case before the Punjab and Haryana High Court (cited by SGPC). “On similar grounds in other cases, a stay has not been granted; and in the other case also the High Court has held that SGPC is bound to give information,” said the advocate.
The notice warns SGPC that if the information is not provided within 15 days of receipt of the notice, the public information officer of the Committee will be liable for all civil and criminal proceedings.
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