Economic
Times: New Delhi: Thursday, 20 November 2014.
A Delhi
Government department has been issued a show cause notice for rejecting an RTI
application on grounds of application fee being drawn in favour of 'accounts
Officer' and not 'executive Engineer'.
The
application sought details of MPLAD funds and their expenses during last five
years on flood control measures. It was returned by the Irrigation department
claiming that name of the payee was wrong on the fee submitted by the
applicant.
"The
Commission directs Rajesh Singh, Executive Engineer: Civil Division:IV to show
cause as to why penalty u/s 20 should not be imposed upon him for not accepting
the IPO in the name of the Accounts Officer despite clear instructions from
DoPT. He is directed to submit his response so as to reach the Commission
within three weeks of receipt of this order," Information Commissioner
Sridhar Acharyulu said in a stern order.
If the
officer fails to explain the reason for rejecting the application, the
Commission may penalise him at the rate of Rs 250 per day from the day
application was filed subject to a maximum penalty of Rs 25,000.
He also
directed the PIO to ensure that while responding to the RTI application, the
PIO should ensure that reference date is mentioned so that appellants do not
find it difficult to link it to their RTI application.
"Department
of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has repeatedly reminded public-authorities to
accept all payments under RTI Act made in 'Accounts Officer'. But difficulties
are being faced by RTI petitioners because of public-authorities not complying with
DoPT circulars," RTI applicant Subhash Agrawal said.
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