RIGHT TO INFORMATION – LAW AND PRACTICE – book by Central Excise JC
Legal Corner Icon — the image was hosted by the publisher and was not captured.The RTI Act has made the common citizen as powerful as an elected representative by bestowing upon him the right to demand all the information, which can be laid before the Parliament or the State Legislature. The provisions of the Act have overriding effect over any provisions of the Official Secrets Act, 1923 or any other law or instruments which are inconsistent with the provisions of the Act, i.e. the information sought under this Act cannot be denied citing the provisions of any other Act.
The Right to Information originates from the judicial pronouncements over the fundamental right of speech and expression under Article 19 of the Constitution of India that also prescribes the restraints that may be placed upon based on the belief that there is no such thing as absolute or uncontrolled liberty free from restraint, for that may lead to anarchy. Any power, if absolute, can only lead to chaos. The Act recognizes that revelation of information in actual practice may conflict with other public interests including efficient operations of the Governments, optimum use of limited fiscal resources and preservation of confidentiality of sensitive information. Therefore, to protect such interests, certain categories of information have been specifically exempted from disclosure.
Hence, the rule of the thumb which all the PIOs may like to follow is to provide to the applicant all the information sought by him, unless it is specifically exempted from disclosure under the Act. However, even amongst these exempted categories, access to information may be permitted if the public interest in disclosure outweighs the harm to the protected interests.
says, Dr. R K Verma, Joint Commissioner of Central Excise in Bhopal in his very informative book, RIGHT TO INFORMATION–LAW AND PRACTICE. This book should be very useful, not only to senior officers of the Central Excise Department but all Government Departments who are shy to part with information. It is commendable that a Central Excise & Customs officer has come out with such a precious book. Perhaps the Government should buy the book in bulk and supply to all PIOs.