Seeking e - mail addresses of private General Insurance Companies using RTI

Background

The appellant filed an application under Right to Information (RTI) Act with the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority, Hyderabad seeking information regarding the email addresses of the main offices of all the private General Insurance Companies in Delhi. The Public Information Officer (PIO) informed the appellant that the information was not maintained by the Public Authority and therefore could not be furnished. He also advised the appellant to refer to the website of the Public Authority, indicating therein the list of websites of all the General Insurers operating in India. The First Appellate Authority (FAA) stated that there are about 2526 General Insurance Companies working in India and sourcing the requested information from all the entities and providing the same to the appellant would disproportionately divert the limited resources of the Public Authority and the same is exempted from disclosure in terms of section 7(9) An information shall ordinarily be provided in the form in which it is sought unless it would disproportionately divert the resources of the public authority or would be detrimental to the safety or preservation of the record in question. of the Right to Information (RTI) Act.

View of CIC

The Central Information Commission (CIC) upheld the decision of the PIO and FAA and dismissed the appeal.

Citation: Mr. R.K. Nain v. Insurance Regulatory Dev in Appeal: No. CIC/DS/A/2011/003529