Disclose governor’s monthly report sent to the centre under RTI: HC
27 Jul, 2013
An application was filed with the Governor's Secretariat of Madhya Pradesh under the Right to Information (RTI) Act seeking to get information about the Governor's monthly reports sent to the centre and the actions taken by the administration based on them.
As the Public Information Officer of the Governor’s secretariat refused to provide the information stating that the subject on which information was sought, was not clearly mentioned, the applicant filed appeal with the First Appellate Authority. After hearing the case, the first appellate authority reversed the PIO’s order and directed him to provide the sought information to the appellant.
However, when the FAA’s order was ignored by the PIO, the appellant, Ajay Dubey, decided to approach the State Information Commission (SIC) but as the MPSIC didn’t have any information commissioner at the time, he had to move Madhya Pradesh High Court.
While hearing the petition filed against officials of Madhya Pradesh Governor's House, the high court said that though Article 226 of the Constitution doesn’t provide for issuance of Mandamus for compliance of any order of any authorities working under different departments within the state, the present case was different in that no further forum was functional in the state under RTI Act. Hence the High Court passed the order that the earlier order of the FAA be complied with and the demanded information be provided to the petitioner within a month.