An analysis of the orders of the CIC : RTI Study 1
29 Aug, 2012RTI STUDY
An analysis of the orders of the Central Information Commission (CIC)
By
Dr. Anuradha Verma, RTI Foundation of India
www.rtifoundationofindia.com
INTRODUCTION
Article 19(1) Any person who, does not receive a decision within the time specified in sub¬section (1) or clause (a) of sub-section (3) of section 7, or is aggrieved by a decision of the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, may within thirty days from the expiry of such period or from the receipt of such a decision prefer an appeal to such officer who is senior in rank to the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer as the case may be, in each public authority: Provided that such officer may admit the appeal after the expiry of the period of thirty days if he or she is satisfied that the appellant was prevented by sufficient cause from filing the appeal in time. of the Constitution grants every citizen the right to freedom of speech and expression and the Right to Information (RTI) Act provided wings to this right. The year 2005 saw the enactment of the RTI Act, 2005 with the objective of bringing accountability and transparency in the public authorities and empowering a citizen to play a more meaningful role in the democracy. The actual enforcement of this Act has been largely left to the Information Commission and hence it is important to understand their working.
The Central Information Commission (CIC) is set up as per Chapter III of the Right to Information Act and it is the authorized body to act upon appeals /complaints from those citizens who have not been able to submit an RTI application or have been denied information by the Central Public Information Officer. Since the inception of the RTI Act, the Central Information Commission (CIC) has played a crucial role in its implementation at the ground level. Though the RTI Act provides an equal status to the CIC and the State Information Commission (SIC), the working of the CIC has received greater public scrutiny, partly because it is in the capital and also because it has tried to set the best parameters for working which has been emulated by many of the SICs. By its transparent working, the CIC has set benchmarks which are comparable with the best anywhere in the world. Barring a few areas, the performance of the CIC has been as per expectations and the CIC has received appreciation for ensuring that public authorities are accountable to the people. The CIC has emerged as one of the most leading, promising and trustworthy body of the Indian polity.
As on day, Shri Satyananda Mishra is the Chief Information Commissioner at the CIC and is assisted by seven Information Commissioners.
METHODOLOGY
The orders of the CIC for the month of July were downloaded from its website and analysed in terms of the drawn parameters and were crosschecked. 2165 orders passed by the CIC in July 2012 were posted on its website till 11th August 2012 and all of these were examined during the course of study.
Abbreviations used:
CIC - Central Information Commission
PIO – Public Information Officer
FAA – First Appellate Authority
OBJECTIVES OF STUDY
The importance of the Information Commission in the implementation of the RTI Act is beyond doubt. However, there has been little effort to study the functioning of the Information Commissions to understand how they have been working and what has been their output. Practically, no effort has been made to analyse the orders of the Information Commission, whether of state or that of the centre, to understand the nuances of the orders and to draw conclusions for future use.
As the CIC is the leading information Commission in the country, it was chosen for the study. The choice of the month of July was not because of any specific reason, it was chosen at random. An attempt has been made to examine all the orders passed by the different benches of the CIC in the month of July from various angles and the results along with the suggestions are put up below.
The main objectives of the study were to identify the broad patterns of decision making at the level of Information Commission. The study involved examining various parameters like:
- The numerical disposal of appeals by each Information Commissioner.
- The disposal of cases by the CIC on a daily basis.
-
The outcome of the appeals
- Percentage of the decisions going in favour of disclosure, partial disclosure, rejection or otherwise.
- Cases remanded back to PIO/ FAA, withdrawn, adjourned, calling for affidavit etc.
-
Imposition of Penal provisions by the CIC:
- The number of cases where penalty was imposed by the CIC including the amount and the number of PIO’s who suffered penalty.
- The number of cases where SCN was issued for imposition of penalty/ dropped.
- Number of cases where enquiry was ordered
- Study of Compensation: The quantum of compensation and the number of cases where compensation was awarded by CIC was studied. The maximum amount and minimum amount of compensation granted in a case by the CIC was determined.
- The number of cases where any recommendation was made to a public authority.
- Clubbing of cases: In case of similar applications, clubbing of orders is often resorted to by the Information Commission. The number of cases where clubbing was resorted to was found out during the study.
- The format of the order issued by the CIC was examined.
STUDY - 1
What has been the outcome of the decision of the CIC?
There has been little effort to study the decisions of Information Commission which can enable us to understand the probability of getting the information at the stage of second appeal. All cases coming before the CIC do not get a decision in favour of disclosure. Knowing about the consequences of filing the appeal and the probable outcome would be helpful in getting an overall picture of the kind of appeals being filed before the CIC. It can help in making broad generalization and would aid in formulating the strategies to reduce the number of appeals coming before the CIC. The decisions were examined to know the likelihood of an appellant getting the information during the second appeal.
All the orders were examined and placed under the following heads.
- Disclosure – The appeals where the CIC ordered for disclosure of information or directed for the inspection of the documents by the appellant have been included here. The cases wherein the CIC held that its earlier order should be implemented and the earlier order directed for disclosure were also included in this category.
- Partial Disclosure – The cases where the CIC accepted the arguments of the appellant in part and allowed disclosure of some of the information sought by the appellant have been included here.
- Rejection – Cases where the CIC upheld the order of the PIO/FAA and rejected the appeals filed by the appellant have been included here.
- Others – All the other cases apart from the above were included in this category. The different types of cases comprising this group are discussed in table - 2.
Table – 1: Outcome of the appeals filed with the CIC
Sr. No. |
Category of cases |
Number of cases |
% of total cases |
1 |
Disclosure |
514 |
24 |
2 |
Partial Disclosure |
153 |
7 |
3 |
Rejection |
725 |
34 |
4 |
Others |
742 |
35 |
5 |
Total |
2134* |
100 |
* In 2 cases, the result could not be ascertained as the relevant cases could not be traced on the CIC website while in 31 other cases, there was no decision regarding disclosure of information as they pertained to penalty etc.
Analysis
The figures show that nearly 1/3 of the appeals before the CIC end in getting at least part of the information sought by the appellant while another 1/3 cases end in rejection. The table indicates that 1 out of 4 appellants have the probability of getting complete information on second appeal before the Information Commission.
The break-up of cases included as “others” in the table above are discussed below.
The others included a wide variety of cases such as:
- Withdrawn – The cases where the appellant requested for withdrawing the appeal and the CIC acceded to the request numbered 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. .
- Transfer the application – The number of cases where the CIC directed to transfer the application to the concerned PIO or to another public authority was 26.
- Transferred to SIC – There were appeals which ought to have been filed before the SIC but were wrongly filed before the CIC. 120 such cases were disposed by transferring to the SIC.
- Remanded to PIO – 331 cases were remanded by the CIC back to the PIO. These included cases to provide the information, for verification of certain information already provided etc.
- Remanded to FAA – There were 173 cases which were remanded by the CIC to the FAA either to hear the appeal and take a decision or verify certain information already provided etc.
- Affidavit – There were 22 The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in the Official Secrets Act, 1923 (19 of 1923), and any other law for the time being in force or in any instrument having effect by virtue of any law other than this Act. cases where the CIC directed the public authority to provide an affidavit about the completeness or correctness of information.
- Adjourned – In 28 cases, the CIC heard the appeal / complaint and gave another date of hearing.
- Decision not traceable - In 2 cases, the CIC directed that the orders given in their earlier orders would be applicable in this case too. However, in spite of thorough search by our team, those two earlier orders could not be traced on the CIC website.
- Others – These included various directions of the CIC excluding all of the above.
Table – 2: Break-up of the cases in the category of ‘others’
Sr. No. |
Category of Others |
Number of cases |
% of total cases |
1 |
Withdrawn |
23 |
3.1 |
2 |
Transfer the application |
26 |
3.5 |
3 |
Transferred to SIC |
119 |
16 |
4 |
Remanded to PIO |
331 |
44.6 |
5 |
Remanded to FAA |
173 |
23.3 |
6 |
Affidavit |
3 |
|
7 |
Adjourned |
28 |
3.8 |
8 |
Decision not traceable |
2 |
0.3 |
9 |
Others |
18 |
2.4 |
Total |
742 |
100 |
Analysis
- At 742, the number of cases in the ‘others’ category is very high.
- Withrawing of the appeals is indicative of the appellant being satisifed with the information provided during the period between filing of application and till the appeal came up for hearing. Appeal was also withdrawn because by the time it came up for hearing before the CIC, information had lost its relevance. It implies that the Information Commission should come up with quicker disposal for ensuring that the faith of the citizen remains in the Information Commission.
- If the CIC has to direct the public authority to do such a simple thing such as transfering the application to the concerned public authority or the deemed PIO, it indicates gross ignorance of law at the level of PIO.
- It is seen that 119 cases were transferred to the SIC which shows that the appellants are ignorant of the provisions of the RTI Act. It is not clear whether the concerned FAA had given the name and adress of the second appellate level. Such incorrect appeals cause a loss of time in providing the information and are a drain on the resources utilised in the scrutiny of the appeals and their subsequent transfer.
- There were 331 and 173 cases repectively which were remanded to the PIO and the FAA by the CIC. As of now, it takes an around 10-12 months for an appeal to be heard by the CIC from the date of filing of the appeal. If the matter is sent back by the Information Commission to the FAA / PIO and the appellant is not satisfied by the reply given by the FAA, he would have to come before the CIC again. The time taken between the filing of an appeal before the CIC and it being heard by the CIC may be so long that the matter may lose all relevance.
- Calling for affidavit from a responsible officer of the public authority is an innovative practise put to good use by the CIC to ensure correctness and completeness of information. This leads to fixing of responsibility and puts pressure on the concerned officer to ensure that information is provided.
- The cases adjourned for another hearing are just over 1% which indicates that most of the cases heard by the CIC are disposed in one hearing.
Suggestions
- In cases where the appellant has exhausted the channel of the FAA, the CIC may take up the case at its own level and no case should be sent back to the FAA / PIO. As far as feasible, the CIC may consider calling for the records before itself for a final disposal instead of remanding the matter back to the FAA/ PIO
- The number of adjourments may be further reduced to a level of less than 1% of the hearings.
- If the appeal has been filed wrongly, it should be immediately sent back to the concerned individual / authority at the time of receiveing the appeal rather than waiting for it to come up for hearing before the CIC through the normal channel. A formal system for seeking the prior approval of the concerned Information Commissioner should be evolved.
STUDY 2 FOLLOWS SHORTLY