Telangana Today: Hyderabad: Wednesday, August 16, 2017.
The CPIO
contended that the information sought belonged to third party and rejected her
plea. He contended no proof of legality of her claim was presented, hence
information about pension could not be given.
As domestic
disputes are increasing and courts of law are flooded with maintenance
petitions, information becomes crucial for adjudication. A daughter-in-law
wanted to know the pension arrears of her father-in-law. As the widow of the
pensioner’s son, she in her capacity as the “putra vadhu” wanted that
information. She was asking for action taken report on representation with
regard to pension arrears of her father-in-law that needed to be settled.
The CPIO
contended that the information sought belonged to third party and rejected her
plea. He contended no proof of legality of her claim was presented, hence
information about pension could not be given. He referred to Swamy’s
compilation of rules but ignored 2005 amendment to Hindu Succession Act,
according to which sons and married/unmarried daughters will have equal share
and the family of the deceased son (wife, sons and daughters) will get a unit
of that deceased son. If the pensioner has two sons and two daughters, all of
them, including family of deceased son, are entitled to the share in the
terminal benefits of the father-in-law after him, if it is not transferred by
him to anybody.
Self-acquired
property
Pension is
also his self-acquired property, which he can distribute or transfer as per his
will. Any amount left in pension account becomes part of estate and needs to be
distributed among his heirs. It is only request for information not for money.
Even if that leads to claim, the court will decide. The public authority should
have verified if they doubted instead of rejecting the plea. As per Section
4(1)(b) of RTI Act, salary details of public servants is information to be
disclosed voluntarily by public authority. If someone is asking for it under 3
or RTI Act, it cannot be denied.
The
Commission directed two CPIOs to show cause why maximum penalty should not be
imposed against each of them for illegally denying the information sought. The
Commission also directed the CPIO to provide information sought for within 15
days from the date of receipt of this order.
Dependent’s
information
In yet
another daughter-in-law’s RTI application a similar issue was raised. The putra
vadhu was seeking the details of the pension paid to her father-in-law. She filed
a petition for maintenance from her estranged husband, for herself and a minor
daughter. The standard reply of the CPIO is that the information cannot be
disclosed as it is third party’s private information and that no larger public
interest was found in the matter. It is true that the information sought was
about third party. But it was neither his personal information nor was there
any need to prove larger public interest as per RTI law, because the pension
related information is official and in public domain. However, there is surely
a larger public interest involved in it.
In her second
appeal she claimed that her husband wrongfully stated in his response to her
petition in court, that his father was fully dependent on him. She also claimed
that her father-in-law who took voluntary retirement from service has given
approval and informed the same to superintendent to disclose. The information
regarding salary of pension of public servant cannot be considered private
information.
As per
Section 4(1)(b) the public authority has to disclose on its own the salaries of
the staff. Generally salary means and includes the ‘pension’. The pension
related information could not be considered as personal or third party
information.
The
Commission finds that the respondent authority has illegally denied the
information sought, without examining that the pension is part of the salary
and financial remuneration for the service rendered to public authority, it is
connected to his public activity, and hence it can not be rejected.
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