Times of India: Chandigarh: Friday, June 28, 2013.
A state
public information officer (SPIO) of Haryana Urban Development Authority
(HUDA), posted at Hisar, is facing a major departmental penalty for not
providing information to a noted RTI activist, ManojKarwasra, as Hisar
divisional commissioner has ordered a charge sheet against the officer for his
"sheer negligence".
Karwasra
wanted information about action on his complaint filed against a few HUDA
officials, who allegedly did not provide complete information to police during
a probe into an FIR lodged against him in 2012.
According to
Karwasra, officials concealed the inquiry report, which had given him a clean
chit in 2010 over his getting a plot from HUDA under reserved category of
paramilitary forces in 2010.
In his recent
order against the SPIO, Balbir Sihag, a deputy superintendent in HUDA, the
commissioner, Neelam Pradeep Kasni, said, "This is sheer negligence and
abdication of duty under the RTI Act. He (SPIO) should be chargesheeted under
section 7 of Haryana Civil Service, punishment and appeal rules, for this act
of misconduct and omission and commission." Acting as appellate authority
in the case, Kasni, who is also administrator of HUDA, Hisar, has asked the
department to supply point-wise information to the activist.
In 2010,
Arvind Kejriwal-founded NGO, Public Cause Research Foundation, had honoured
Karwasra with national RTI award for using the Act to expose corruption and
encroachment of land by influential people of his village panchayat at great
personal risk, getting encroachment removed and action taken against the guilty.
HUDA
officials in 2010 probed a complaint received against Kadwasra, a retired
paramilitary (ITBP) man. It was alleged that he got allotment of a residential
plot in Hisar fraudulently against the defence personnel quota by submitting a
false affidavit. According to the inquiry report, Karwasra had made an
application claiming that he was a retired paramilitary staff. However, as per
HUDA policy, there was no eservation for retired paramilitary personnel.
"Accordingly,
the application should have been considered with general category candidates.
Instead, it was considered under ex-servicemen category. This lapse has duly
been admitted by the estate officer, HUDA. There is no fault or fraud at the
level of the applicant (Karwasra)," mentioned Krishan Lal, incharge of
urban branch at HUDA office, Panchkula in the report submitted in 2010.
Two years
later, police lodged an FIR against Karwasra on the complaint of a Hisar
resident. According to Karwasra, he then filed a complaint against HUDA
officials and others for concealing the previous inquiry report during the
police probe.
To find out
the action taken on his complaint, Karwasra filed an RTI application with the
SPIO of HUDA, Hisar on March 25. As he did not receive a reply to his query, he
filed an appeal before the commissioner-cum-administrator of HUDA on May 6.
.JPG)
.JPG)
