The Hindu: Bangalore: Monday,
February 03, 2014.
‘Consumer
Protection Act can be invoked if there is deficiency in providing services
under RTI’
Now, people
can approach consumer forums against lapses on the part of the authorities
while giving information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
‘Deficiency
of service’
In a
first-of-its-kind decision in the State, a consumer forum in Bangalore has
ruled that the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act could be invoked
whenever there was a “deficiency by the public authorities in providing
services” under the RTI Act.
Under the
Act, a public authority is required to provide certain services, and when the
authority fails to do so, it amounts to “deficiency of service” and for such
lapses the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act are applicable, according
to the Third Additional Urban Bangalore District Consumer Disputes Redressal
Forum.
Order
A Bench
comprising forum president T. Rajashekaraiah and member Subhashini passed an
order on January 23 on a complaint by K. Dhananjay, an engineer working with
the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Koramangala, Bangalore, against the
director of institute.
Fees
The IIA had
collected Rs. 286 and Rs. 314 on two occasions in 2010–11 for providing certain
documents after the Central Information Commission (CIC) directed it to supply
information to Mr. Dhananjay when he complained that the institute failed to
provide certain documents under the RTI Act.
The
institute supplied the documents after the 30-day deadline lapsed.
The forum
found that under Section 7 of the RTI Act, public authorities would have to
supply information/documents for free if the information sought was supplied
after the 30-day deadline.
Following
this, the forum held that the action of the institute in collecting fees was
“illegal” and hence amounted to “deficiency of service”, and directed the
institute to refund Rs. 600 collected as fee to the complainant along with Rs.
900 as the cost of litigation.
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