Deccan
Herald: Bengaluru: Friday, 10 July 2015.
Apart from
the favouritism shown to Y Ashwin, son of Lokayukta Justice Y Bhaskar Rao, in
furnishing information under the RTI Act, the office of the Lokayukta also
provided him more information than he had sought in his application, it has
emerged.
It is found
that a person by name J Kumar, a staffer at the office of the advocate who
appeared for Ashwin before the High Court, had filed the RTI application on
June 30. This apart, when this file moved rapidly through all the departments,
Justice Rao himself had directed officials to “issue copies immediately”. The
Lokayukta institution has provided him eight documents of 20 pages.
The RTI
application filed by Kumar with seven questions was filed on June 30. The same
day it was placed before three different sections within the Lokayukta office.
Though the questions asked in the application were vague and unspecific, the
office of the Lokayukta took pains and provided him with all information,
including a few not asked for in the application. In the application, it was
also noted that the information should be furnished within 48 hours under the
RTI Act.
The members
of Janadhikara Sangharsha Parishath (JSP) had filed an application on June 29
seeking Justice Rao’s June 9 order for enquiry on SP (Lokayukta) Sonia Narang’s
report. “We finally got the reply on July 4, four days after Ashwin was
provided the information. On our first RTI application filed on June 18,
seeking details of CCTV footage, there has been no reply yet.
“When we got
to know about the swift reply to Ashwin, facilitating him to file the writ
petition, we filed another RTI application asking how many people filed RTI
applications on June 30 and how many got information. On this, we got a reply
on July 8 stating that five applications were filed on June 30 seeking various
information and out of which information was furnished to only one applicant,
Kumar. Besides, Kumar had not asked for Lokyukta’s June 9 order, yet he was
provided this order, which was used by the Lokayukta to supersede Upalokayukta
Justice Subhash B Adi’s judicial order for investigation on June 23,” Adarsh
Iyer of JSP said.
The
application filed by Kumar was placed before the Registrar Lokayukta, Admin-1
office, and also before the Lokayukta’s personal secretary office. When it was
placed before the Lokayukta, a note had been written stating, “Issue copies
immediately in accordance with the law.”
“There is
unnecessary to-and-fro communication between the ADGP and the Registrar after
an important report filed by Narang on May 11. Instead, there should have been
an immediate order for investigation. Why did the Lokayukta take undue interest
in issuing instructions for dispatching the information on this RTI
application. What was the need for such a hurry; and is this not conflict of
interest,” Adarsh asked.
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