New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday (January 7) said that the sanctioned posts in the Central/State Information Commissions need to be filled up and questioned that what is the use of creating an institution if there are no person to perform the duties.
The court made the comments while a bench of Justices Surya Kant and N. Kotiswar Singh was hearing a PIL filed by activist Anjali Bhardwaj and others who raised the issue of various posts lying vacant in the CIC and SICs.
“Whatever sanctioned posts are there in the Central/State Information Commissions…they need to be filled up…otherwise, what is the use of creating an institution if it does not have persons to perform the duties?” said Justice Kant in response to advocate Prashant Bhushan’s submissions that the failure of state governments to fill up the vacancies in the Commissions defeats the very basis of the RTI Act, reported LiveLaw.
“Everybody is interested in killing the Right to Information Act because nobody wants to give out any information and the easiest way to kill it is to render this Information Commissions all defunct. This is the way they have found to kill the RTI law”, said Bhushan, representing the petitioners.
The Supreme Court noted from the status reports of various states that even though most of the states have initiated the selection process to fill up the vacancies in the Commissions, there was no commitment to a timeline within which appointments should be made.
The court directed that the list of applicants be notified within one week, composition of Search Committee (along with the criteria prescribed for shortlisting) be notified within 1 week thereafter; the timeline within which interviews shall be completed be notified, which shall not be more than 6 weeks from the date the composition of the Search Committee and the criteria are notified and on receipt of recommendations, the competent authority shall scrutinize and make appointments within 2 weeks.
“All the states shall separately find out the total pendency before the Information Commissions and such information shall also be furnished”, the court added.
