Arbitrary
Disposal of Case by Sashiprava Bindhani, retired SIC of Odisha
Dear friends
Sri Hrushikesh Tripathy, a native of Thakurmunda
block of Mayurbhanj district
had filed RTI Application dt. 19.9.2018 to the
PIO-cum- Managing Director, LAMPS ,
Thakurmunda , Mayurbhanj district
seeking information about details
of procedure followed for
appointment of staff in LAMPS.
It needs to be mentioned here that there
was illegal appointment by MD, LAMPS
violating Govt. procedure
and guidelines. RTI was used
to bring to limelight the illegalities in the appointment process. On 16.10.18, the PIO wrote a letter asking him to deposit Rs. 1,50,000.00 towards cost of the
information. Being aggrieved by
the decision of the PIO, Sri Tripathy
filed first appeal dt. 24.10.18 to the First
Appellate Authority to hear
the appeal petition and give him
justice. The FAA
did not hear the
case . Then he filed
Second Appeal dt. 6.12.2018 before Odisha Information Commission for inquiry
into the matter and provide
information free of cost.
The Second
appeal petition registered as SA 3238/18 was
heard by Sashiprava Bindhani ,
State Information Commissioner on 20.12.19 at Camp Court held at Baripada, district headquarter
of Mayurbhanj district. Though
Hrushikesh attended the hearing, neither
the PIO nor FAA attended the hearing.
Mrs. Bindhani issued show cause
notice to the PIO and FAA , LAMPCS
to appear in person on 11.3.20. Both of them appeared
before the Commission
on that day and submitted their
written memorandum which was
handed over to the appellant for submission of discrepancy, if any. During
hearing Hrushikesh objected and appraised the commission that the written
memorandum given to him did not carry
any information sought for. The
Commission observed that
the said information would be
available under section 4 (1)(b) of the RTI Act and directed
the PIO to comply
it and indicate which information are available under
section 4 of the RTI Act.
Despite order
of the Commission, the PIO
and the First Appellate Authority
neither complied nor
provided any information nor web-hosted information in their website . As
Mrs. Sashiprava Bindhani, SIC is
about to retire in the month of June, 20, she
hurriedly conducted hearing
of the case on 4.6.20
without any intimation to the
appellant and PIO
and issued direction to the
PIO to comply the
direction of the Commission as
stated above within one month and
closed the case.
Though
two months passed, the PIO neither
complied direction of the
Commission nor provided any
information to the
information-seekers. The Appellant
Sri Hrushikesh took all pains
of three years to get
the information. His
struggle ended in fiasco, as
the Commission closed
the case without
ensuring the information.
As general practice prevails
in the office of Odisha Information Commission,
the Commission can not close the
case without ensuring
the information. Now
the appellant was left
in hopeless world and
new he has to
renew his struggle
again from scratch to get the
information in order to
expose corruption and
irregularities in LAMPS.
Sri Hrushikesh
Tripathy can be contacted in M- 8328905766
Pradip Pradhan
M-9937843482
