The
Asian Age: Lucknow: Friday, 04 March 2016.
In a bizarre
incident, a CRPF DIG in reply to a RTI query has said that since the applicant
is “a Muslim, a religion associated with terrorism, he could not be given the
information sought by him due to security reasons.”
The incident
relates to an RTI query sought by one Shams Tabrez, a resident of Usiya village
in Ghazipur district, about the grounds on which he was not selected for the
post of constable at a recruitment drive held at the centre.
According to
Shams, a paragraph in the letter states that he could not be given the
documents that he had sought because he belonged to the Muslim community, which
is a religion of terrorists. “This kind of response is bizarre,” he said.
Shams, after
receiving the response, sent a letter to the Allahabad group centre of Central
Reserve Police Force (CRPF).
An internal
inquiry conducted by officials at the centre found that it did receive the said
query in November 2015 about its recruitment process, but the reply sent early
last month did not contain the objectionable reference. It was apparently
inserted later on by a mischief maker.
Central
Reserve Police Force DIG D.K. Tripathi, who is also the central information
officer (CIO) at the centre, said that the original letter issued against the
particular RTI query did not have the paragraph in question.
“We have come
to know about the issue and will soon be lodging an FIR with the Allahabad
police in connection with the said CRPF reply to the RTI query,” he said.
Shams Tabrez
had appeared for recruitment as a constable at the Allahabad centre in 2010 and
was not selected.
In December
2012, he moved an RTI query addressed to the Director-General, CRPF, seeking
details of why he was not selected.
In the year
2013, he got a reply from the paramilitary force stating that he was not
selected as he was medically unfit. He later sought details of his medical test
and received this response which pointed to his religion.
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