A public authority should maintain list of employees covered under master policies
18 Jun, 2013Background
The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) seeking reasons for non-release of his superannuation pension. 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; 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; of the RTI Act.
Proceedings
During the hearing before the Central Information Commission (CIC), the respondent submitted that a copy of the Master policy was denied under the provisions of 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; 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; of the Act on the grounds that this document is a contract between the employer and LIC. The respondent further clarified that as and when an employee of the company retires, the Trustees (employer) purchases immediate annuity from LIC and pension is released by LIC. The appellant submitted that he had made many efforts to obtain information from his employer, Southern Petrochemical Industries Ltd., (SPIC) but to no avail. He also submitted that a similarly situated colleague and ex-employee of the company was receiving retirement benefits while the same had been denied to him under this scheme therefore the disclosure of information by the public authority was vital for him to obtain his legitimate dues as a retired pensioner of the company.
View of CIC
The Commission observed that the list of names of the employees who are covered by such Group Superannuation policies is invariably not provided by the employer to the insurer, leaving a big information gap which presents problems for pensioners as the employer company which is a private company does not respond to them and the LIC washes their hands off the matter by stating that they do not hold the list of employees who are covered by the scheme and only initiate action after the employer company approaches them to purchase immediate annuity in respect of a retired employee. This lack of transparency does not augur well for the protection of the interests of a large section of the community which is covered by such master policies. In larger public interest, the Commission directed the PIO, LIC to provide a copy of the Master policy to the appellant after severing, as per the provisions of section 10(1) Where a request for access to information is rejected on the ground that it is in relation to information which is exempt from disclosure, then, notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, access may be provided to that part of the record which does not contain any information which is exempt from disclosure under this Act and which can reasonably be severed from any part that contains exempt information. of the Act, those portions which if disclosed will cause detriment to the commercial interests of the insurer. Under section 25(5) of the RTI Act, the Commission recommended the CMD of LIC to examine the possibility of maintaining updated list of employees covered under each of the master policies pertaining to Group Superannuation. This measure will go a long way in protecting the interests of retiring employees who are otherwise left to the mercy of the employer company for release of pension.
Citation: Mr. I. Dhakshinamurthy v. LIC of India in Appeal: No. CIC/DS/A/2012/002035
RTI Citation : RTIFI/2013/CIC/1372
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