Oneindia:
New delhi: Wednesday, 04 February 2015.
National
Dairy Development Board (NDDB) subsidiary Mother Dairy Fruit and Vegetable
Private Limited has been declared a "public authority" as defined
under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, making it amenable to disclosure of
information.
A Delhi High
Court bench of Justice Vibhu Bakhru dismissed the petition filed by Mother
Dairy Fruit and Vegetable Pvt Ltd, which had challenged the Central Information
Commission (CIC) April 15, 2011 order holding it to be a "Public
Authority" within the meaning of section 2(h) of the 2005 RTI Act.
"The
entire equity of the petitioner is held by the NDDB. Thus, even though
petitioner's Board of Directors manages its affairs, NDDB would exercise
control over the affairs of the petitioner as its principal shareholder.
"The
power of shareholders of a company to appoint and remove directors results in
them exerting real influence over the affairs of a company. The Central
Government retains complete control over NDDB and for all practical purposes,
it is an instrumentality of the Central Government.
"In the
present case, the basic infrastructure of the petitioner's (Mother Dairy)
undertakings were promoted by funds provided by the Central Government; whether
the said funds found their way through NDDB or otherwise is not material.
"Thus,
in my view, the petitioner would also be a public authority on account of being
substantially financed by the Central Government," the bench said.
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