Times of India: Raipur: Sunday, March 17, 2013.
Central
Information Commission (CIC) will hear an appeal filed by a Raipur-based RTI
activist with regard to public sector bank, State Bank of India (SBI) denying
him information on names of defaulters who have availed a loan of Rs one crore
or more and have not paid back since last three years.
Sanjay Thul,
an activist, had filed an application under the Right to Information Act (RTI)
with SBI Corporate office, seeking list of non-performing assets (NPAs) of Rs
one crore or more, names and addresses of customers and also requesting to
upload these details on SBI's website in public interest.
However, SBI
DGM (RTI) and central public information officer (CPIO) Gautam Banerjee only
disclosed information on the number of defaulters and the total amount outstanding.
According to the bank there are 2254 NPAs above Rs one crore with a total
outstanding amount of Rs 19891.06 crore. The bank refused to divulge names of
the defaulters on the ground that information sought is a 'commercial
confidence' between bank and third party. Also, information with bank is in its
fiduciary capacity and is exempt under the RTI act.
"I had
sought details after seeing an SBI notice in local newspapers, in which the
bank had published photographs and names of defaulters who had availed small
loans. But the bank is concealing names of 2254 big fishes," Sanjay Thul
told TOI.
Thul said he
preferred a first appeal arguing that SBI is a PSU Bank and NPA of the bank was
ultimately loss of government and thus of common public. Hence disclosure of
names was in larger public interest. But the first appellate authority upheld
the CPIO's decision, he added. In his second appeal with the CIC, the activist
has quoted an earlier CIC decision in the case of P P Kaoppr Vs Reserve Bank of
India in which then information commissioner Shailesh Gandhi had directed RBI
to disclose names of defaulters of PSU banks on the bank's website.
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