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| The order passed by CIC | | | " There is no denying the fact that the information seeker has undeniably filed RTI application before the PIO -cum DFO, Forest Jammu on 07.1.2010 and as per the statutory obligation cast on him under Section 7 of the State RTI Act 2009, order was to be passed on the said application by the PIO as expeditiously as possible and in any case within 30 days of the receipt of the request.
This is also an admitted fact that no such order was passed within the statutory period of time. The State Right to Information Act confers an important right on the residents of the state to access the information held by the public authorities.
Providing of such right has been equated with the fundamental right is aimed for bringing transparency and accountability in the working of the public authorities. PIO has failed to discharge his duties as per the State RTI Act.
Therefore Commission in accordance with the powers vested in it under section 17 of the State RTI Act holds Khawaja Qamar-u- Din, DFO-cum-PIO Forest Complex, Dogra Hall Jammu to be in default and hereby impose a penalty on him which is worked as under:-
1. No of days of default 275 days
2. Penalty to be imposed for each day Rs.250/-
3. Total amount of penalty comes to Rs. Rs.68750/-
But since the State RTI Act under Section 17 provides that where a PIO without any reasonable cause refused to receive an application for information or has not furnished information within the time specified under the sub section (1) of Section 7 or deliberately denied the request for information or knowingly given incorrect, incomplete or misleading information or destroyed information which was the subject of the request or obstructed in any manner in furnishing the information, it shall impose a penalty of two hundred fifty rupees each day till application is received or information is furnished, so however, the total amount of such penalty shall not exceed twenty five thousand rupees.
Accordingly, a penalty of Rs.25000/- is imposed on Khawaja Qamar-u-Din, DFO-Cum-PIO Forest Complex, Dogra Hall, Jammu. The Drawing and Disbursing Officer of Forest Department will ensure deduction of penalty amount of Rs.25000/- (Rupees twenty five thousand only) from the salary of Khawaja Qamar-u-Din, DFO-cum-PIO in two equal installments from the months of August and September,2013 and remit it to the Government Account Head"0070-other administrative services" with an intimation to this Commission.
The DDO is further directed to submit a compliance report along with a copy of deduction certificate/ challan with T.V. No and date to this Commission within 5 days of the compliance." |
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