Hindustan Times: National: Monday,
July 11, 2016.
The home
ministry has declined to share details of file notings related to extension of
service granted to senior IAS officer B K Prasad, who went into the missing
files related to the alleged fake encounter killing of Ishrat Jahan, saying
being an adjunct to proposal of a Cabinet panel it cannot be disclosed.
The ministry
was asked to provide copies of file notings on two-month extension given to
Prasad who was to superannuate on May 31, 2016.
19-year-old
Ishrat Jahan and three others were killed in an alleged fake encounter in
Gujarat in 2004. The Gujarat Police had then claimed those killed were LeT
terrorists and had gone there to assassinate the then Chief Minister Narendra
Modi.
The papers,
which disappeared from the Home Ministry, include the copy of an affidavit
vetted by the then Attorney General and submitted in the Gujarat High Court in
2009 and the draft of the second affidavit vetted by the AG to which changes
were made by the then Home Minister P Chidambaram.
As the file
notings in this regard are an adjunct to an Appointments Committee of Cabinet
(ACC) proposal, the same is exempted under Section 8 (1) (I) of the
transparency law, it said in reply to an RTI query filed by PTI.
The section
bars disclosure of “Cabinet papers including records of deliberations of the
council of ministers, secretaries and other officers”.
Prasad, a
1983 batch IAS officer of Tamil Nadu cadre, was due to retire in May end. He
was granted extension for a period of two months with effect from June 1, 2016
to July 31, an official order had said without mentioning the reason behind it.
When asked
for the reason for granting extension to Prasad, the MHA said, “As far as
asking the reasons for a decision is concerned, the same is not covered under
the RTI Act”.
The officer
was recently in news for allegedly “tutoring” witnesses in the missing files
case, a charge denied by him.
The home
ministry had recently asked an RTI applicant to prove he is Indian before
disclosing details on the extension given to Prasad.
Following an
uproar in Parliament in March this year, the home ministry had asked Prasad to
inquire into the matter of missing papers. The panel submitted its report last
month.
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