NEW DELHI, Nov 6: Delhi High Court today directed the Government to appoint three commissioners at the Central Information Commission (CIC) within six weeks from among the 553 applications received in response to two notifications issued last year, as the vacant posts have led to a massive backlog of cases.
A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw said the September 9 circular of the Department of Personnel and Training inviting applications for appointment of Chief Information Commissioner (Chief IC) and Information Commissioners (ICs), shall be confined to the post of the transparency panel’s head which would fall vacant from December 2.
Noting that apart from the three vacant IC posts, a fourth one is likely to fall vacant by December 2 if an IC is promoted as Chief IC, the court said the vacancy which would arise should also be filled up from the applications received in response to the circular.
“Instead of setting aside the notification dated September 9, we consider it appropriate to issue direction that the selection process that has already been commenced vide notifications dated February 25, 2014 and July 16, 2014 shall be finalised within six weeks from today and the three vacancies of Information Commissioners existing as of today shall be filled up from amongst the 553 applications that were received in response to the said two notifications.
“The selection process pursuant to the circular dated September 9 shall be confined for selection and appointment of the Chief Information Commissioner in the vacancy that would arise with effect from December 2, and one Information Commissioner which is likely to arise with effect from December 2, 2015,”the bench said.
In June this year, the senior-most IC Vijay Sharma was appointed as the Chief of the Commission and in his place, Sudhir Bhargava was appointed as the IC. The post of Chief IC was lying vacant for over 10 months.
The court’s order came on a PIL filed by RTI activists R K Jain, Lokesh K Batra and Subhash Chandra Agarwal, who had alleged that no action has been taken on the issue despite two “distress” letters written by CIC to the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).
The petitioners had contended that the September 9 circular was nothing but an attempt to delay the entire process of appointing the ICs against the three vacancies.
They had sought a direction to forthwith appoint the remaining three ICs in CIC and set aside the circular.
To this, the court said it was “unable to understand as to why the respondents have again issued a fresh notification on September 9, 2015.”
It observed that the list of the Chief IC and the IC holding office as of today, furnished by Government’s standing counsel Jasmeet Singh, reflects that the tenure of one of the IC out of seven would expire on December 31, 2016 and the others have a long tenure of over two years.
“As is evident, there is no likelihood of any vacancy of IC in near future. However, the Chief IC’s tenure will be completed on December 1, 2015. In case one of the serving IC is appointed as the Chief IC in the vacancy that would arise with effect from December 2, 2015, one more vacancy of the Information Commissioner is likely to arise,” it added.
The PIL filed through lawyers Prashant Bhushan had sought filling up of posts of Chief IC and subordinate staff in a time-bound frame.
The petition had stated that due to non-appointment of the CIC since 23 August 2014, the appeals and complaints relating to important authorities including CVC, CBI, PMO, CAG, President’s Secretariat, Cabinet Secretariat, Supreme Court and High Courts, Lok Sabha, DOPT, UPSC and Staff Selection Commission were not being heard.
There is a vacuum of jurisdiction at CIC for more than 100 public authorities and departments, as no officiating arrangements for CIC have been made, it has said.
The RTI Act prescribes a statutory time-line of 30 days for providing information from the date of application and within 45 days after disposal of first appeal.
The petition had further contended that these time-lines were defeated due to non-appointment in the CIC which was now taking nearly 2-3 years to hear the complaints. (PTI)
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