Can registration and recognition details of hospital be disclosed under RTI?
15 Oct, 2012Background
The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) seeking information pertaining to Kasturba Hospital run by BHEL, list of banned medicines published by World Health Organisation (WHO) India, their side effects, hippocratic oath, provisions for criminal action on its violation and process to apply for the same. The appellant also sought guidelines by Indian Medical Council for Indoor and OPD patient treatment and regarding symptoms and ailments of patients. The appellant further wanted to know the bifurcation of medicines according to the source – chemical, mineral, herbal and animal, list of generic names of medicines source wise, source wise list of medicine in market substitute medicines with their standard/ popular names etc. The Public Information Officer (PIO) replied to the appellant. In the second appeal filed before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the appellant stated that the information sought has been hidden to protect the autocracy of hospital staff and adamant attitude of doctors in BHEL hospital, corruption in purchase and distribution of substandard medicines resulting in harassment of employees.
Proceedings
During the hearing before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the respondent submitted that the appellant is employee of BHEL hence the information supplied to him under the RTI Act was already available to him through the intranet facility of the company. The respondent also stated that the appellant is in the habit of raising vague queries under the RTI Act just to show his importance amongst other employees. The respondent further stated that there did not appear any public purpose in any of the information sought by him.
View of CIC
The Commission directed the PIO to provide documents pertaining to registration and recognition of the aforementioned hospital to the appellant and if the hospital was not registered the appellant should be informed accordingly. The Commission dismissed the appeal stating that they did not find any reason to interfere in the rest of the replies of the respondent.
Citation: Mr. Harish Chandra Gupta v. Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd. in Case No. CIC/SS/A/2012/001287
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2012/CIC/726
Click here to view original RTI order of Court / Information Commission