Skip to main content

Pending arbitration no ground for withholding info: CIC

Pendency of an arbitration proceeding or a litigation cannot be a reason to deny information to an RTI applicant by any government department, the Central Information Commission has ruled.

"The mere pendency of arbitration proceedings is not sufficient justification by itself for withholding the information. The RTI Act provides no exemption from disclosure requirement for sub-judice matters.

"The only exemption in sub-judice matters is regarding what has been expressly forbidden by a court or a tribunal and what may constitute contempt of court," Information Commissioner Basant Seth said in his order.

The case relates to an RTI petitioner who sought from MTNL, through 34 different applications, details of expenditure which are being inquired into by the authorities.

The Information officer refused to disclose the information citing section 8(1)(h) of the RTI.

The section prohibits disclosure of information which would impede the process of investigation or apprehension or prosecution of offenders.

The officer said the appellant is a contractor who has been black-listed by the department in 2007 and various disputes regarding his payments are presently before an arbitrator and hence the information sought by him is exempt under Section 8(1)(h) of the RTI Act.

However, Seth said the information requested by the petitioner cannot be denied on this ground, saying, "...the denial of information under Section 8(1)(h) of the RTI Act cannot be sustained...the CPIO should allow the appellant to inspect the relevant records relating to his aforesaid 34 RTI applications within 45 days from the date of receipt of this order."

Comments

Post a Comment

Most viewed this month

Appellate authorities under Special Statutes cannot be asked to condone delay

Madras High Court in R.Gowrishankar vs. The Commissioner of Service Tax has held that Appellate authorities cannot be asked to condone the delay, beyond the extended period of limitation A Division Bench comprising of Justices S. Manikumar and D. Krishnakumar, made this observation while considering an appeal filed against Single Bench order declining to set aside the order made in the condone delay petition filed by the petitioner to condone 223 days in filing the appeal before the Commissioner of Service Tax (Appeals). Article referred: http://www.livelaw.in/appellate-authorities-special-statutes-cannot-asked-condone-delay-beyond-extended-period-limitation-madras-hc/
Post a Comment
Read more

'Seize assets to pay damages to accident victim'

Her story might be an inspiration for the physically challenged but justice has remained elusive for her. In 2008, a bus accident left research engineer S Thenmozhi, 30, paraplegic. In April 2013, the motor accident claims tribunal directed the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) to provide her a compensation of 57.9 lakh. However, TNSTC refused to budge and on Tuesday a city court ordered attaching of movable assets of the transport corporation. Thenmozhi was employed in C-DOT, a telecom technology development centre in Bangalore. On July 21, 2008, she was coming to Chennai in a private bus. Around 2am, the bus had a flat tyre and the driver parked it on the left side of the road near Pallikonda in Vellore district on the Bangalore-Chennai highway. While the tyre was being changed, a TNSTC bus of Dharmapuri division hit the stationary bus. The rear part of the bus was smashed and passengers were injured. Thenmozhi who had a seat at the back of the bus suffered...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mumbai ITAT rules income of offshore discretionary trust is subject to tax in India

The Mumbai Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) has recently determined the following issue in the affirmative in the case of Manoj Dhupelia: Should the income of an offshore discretionary trust be subject to tax in India, if no distributions have been made to beneficiaries in India? The question arose from appeals filed by individual beneficiaries in relation to a Lichtenstein-based trust, the Ambrunova Trust and Merlyn Management SA (the Trust) with the ITAT. It is important to note that the individuals in this case were amongst those first identified by the Government of India (GOI) as holding undeclared bank accounts in Lichtenstein. The ITAT ruling raises the following issues: Taxation of Trust Corpus: ITAT classified the corpus of the trust as "undisclosed income" and declared it taxable in the hands of the beneficiaries. Taxation of Undistributed Income: ITAT refused to draw a distinction between the corpus and undistributed income from the trust and declared i...
Post a Comment
Read more