Over 50% posts of info commissioner in CIC vacant: Plea

Satya Prakash

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, October 19

With six out of 11 posts of information commissioner, including that of the chief commissioner, lying vacant in the Central Information Commission (CIC), an RTI activist has moved the Supreme Court, highlighting the problems of the functioning of India’s top transparency watchdog.

“There is currently a backlog of over 36,600 cases in the CIC,” RTI activist Anjali Bhardwaj said in an application filed in the top court.

Highlighting the twin problems of vacancy and pendency, Bhardwaj urged the top court to take up the matter urgently.

The Supreme Court is already seized of a PIL regarding timely and transparent appointment of information commissioners in CIC and SICs under the RTI Act, 2005.

The top court had in February last year directed the government to fill all vacancies in CIC and SICs in a timely and transparent manner.

It had said the government should ensure that non-bureaucrats were also appointed as information commissioners in CIC and SICs.

Pointing out that in December last year the top court had given three months to the Centre to fill the vacancies that existed in the CIC, Bhardwaj alleged that the order has not been complied with.