Central Information Commission (CIC): The Commission recently dealt with an appeal seeking information regarding ‘Mann ki Baat’ program which was further disposed of by the commission on no additional scope of intervention.
The RTI application filed sought information regarding ‘Mann ki Baat’ program which included the information of the total number of video, audio and in writing messages received from the start by the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India. For the said issue, appellant was responded by the CPIO on 04-12-2017.
The respondent stated in response to the appeal that various suggestions and grievances are received under the said program from several sources and based on the nature of communication, they are forwarded to the concerned departments. Due to such voluminous data being received and forwarded to different departments based on the issue, it gets all scattered and retrieving all the information to be served would eventually require the resources from the office to work on this instead of the normal discharge of its functions attracting Section 7(9) of the RTI Act. It was also stated that no particular officials have been assigned to handle the communication received under ‘Mann ki Baat’.
Therefore, noting and observing the stated reasons filed by the respondent, Commission was satisfied and was in its favour which further lead the appeal to be disposed of. [Aseem Takya v. CPIO, PMO,2018 SCC OnLine CIC 391, order dated 05-06-2018]