Can a Director obtain information about his company account from the bank using RTI?
21 Apr, 2012
Background
The appellant claimed that the Registrar of Companies had declared him as a director of a company but the bank had stated in one of its communications that he was not a director. In this regard, the appellant filed the RTI application seeking a copy of the form number 32 furnished by the company to find out whether his name appeared on that form or not. The Public Information Officer (PIO) denied the information under section 8(1)(d) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information including commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property, the disclosure of which would harm the competitive position of a third party, unless the competent authority is satisfied that larger public interest warrants the disclosure of such information; and (e) of the RTI Act stating that it was a third party information and involved commercial confidence.
View of CIC
The Central Information Commission observed that the information sought clearly relates to the account of a third party customer of the bank and unless the appellant has any connection to that account, in normal course, no information about the account can be disclosed to him. The Commission directed the PIO to disclose the information only if the appellant furnishes any document/ authorisation from the competent authority showing him as a director of the said company.
Citation: Shri Jaskaran Singh Khurana v. Punjab National Bank in File no. CIC/SM/A/2011/000841
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2012/CIC/221
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission