Complaint filed Against DC Office Poonch for non Compliance of RTI Act:

No  Proactive Disclosure Under RTI Act  

Complaint filed Against DC Office Poonch

Jammu, 15/July/2020: A complaint under section 18 of the Right to Information Act 2005 has been filed with the Central Information Commission  against office of the Deputy Commissioner Poonch for its failure to make proactive disclosure of Information which is compulsory to be made under section 4(1)(b) of the RTI Act 2005.

RAMAN

In his complaint before the CIC dated 14/July/2020 vide diary no 677786, RTI activist Raman Sharma has submitted that DC office Poonch, the respondent Public Public Authority was under legal obligation as per section 4 of the Right to Information Act to pro-actively disclose certain kind of information but unfortunately for the reason best know to the respondent (DC Office), no such information was made available pro actively for the public and people have to resort to file individual  RTI applications to even get this information which otherwise should have already been in public domain and innocent citizens are compelled to spend money and time to get this information.

In the        complaint it     is      further stated         that the Respondent P.A also have   its    dedicated website   " POONCH.NIC.IN “ but there also no information as mentioned under section 4 is published which is clear violation of the Right to Information Act 2005.

Seeking directions for the DC office Poonch, the RTI activist have requested the CIC to direct the respondent to  take necessary action and suo-moto disclose all mandatory information as required under section 4 of the Right to Information Act 2005 on its official website  and apprise the honourable CIC about the action taken thereof along with a copy to the complainant.

 Sharma also informed that Right to Information Act casts an obligation on the Public Authority  to publish pro actively information under section 4(1)(b) within 120 days from the enactment of this act and as the Right to Information Act 2005 is applicable in  the Union Territory of J & K right from 31^st October 2019 after repeal  of its previous Jammu and Kashmir Right to Information Act 2009 thus DC Office Poonch should have disclosed this information on its own. 

The complaint also highlights   the inaction on the part of the respondent Public Authority that did not act as per the mandate of the RTI Act and called it as deliberate attempt of the respondent Public Authority to seize lawful right of the citizens of India.

===================================