The Sen Times: Bhopal: Monday, February 12, 2018.
The Madhya
Pradesh government has declined to share details of meetings of civil services
board that decides on the postings of bureaucrats, saying they were
“confidential” and barred under the RTI Act.
As per rules,
all states should have a civil services board to decide on transfers and
postings of bureaucrats– mainly officers of Indian Administrative Service
(IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS) and Indian Forest Service (IFoS).
The board is
mandated to decide on the transfer of a civil servant before completion of his
or her fixed tenure.
Anti-corruption
activist Ajay Dubey had filed an RTI application with the state government to
know the details of proceedings of board during the months of July, August and
September 2017.
The state
government in its reply said the information consisted of communication between
the state government and the Centre, which was confidential in nature and it
could not be shared.
It cited
Section 8(1)(j) of the transparency law to decline the information.
The section
bars “personal information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any
public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the
privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information Officer or the
State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority, as the case may
be, is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of
such information”.
The service
rules, however, mandate the civil services board to submit an annual report on
January 1 to the central government about the date of the meetings held by them
and also to upload the same on the website of the concerned state government or
Union territory in public domain.
Dubey said
there is no such data in public domain on the proceedings of the civil services
board of the Madhya Pradesh.
“The plea of
secrecy or confidentiality is illogical.
The state
government is trying to hide something,” he said.
The civil
services board is headed by chief secretary of a state and has senior most
additional chief secretary or chairman, Board of Revenue, financial
commissioner or an officer of equivalent rank and status as member.
In addition,
it will have principal secretary or secretary, Department of Personnel in the
state government as member secretary.
To insulate
the bureaucracy from political interference and to put an end to frequent
transfers of civil servants by political bosses, the Supreme Court had in 2013
directed the Centre and the states to set up a civil services board to consider
transfers and postings of bureaucrats among others.
The stability
of all India services officers IAS, IPS and IFoS especially in the states, has
been a matter of concern for a long time.
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