PUTHIYATHERU URBAN CO-OPREATIVE SOCIETY LIMITED V. Vs. JOINT REGISTRAR OF CO-OPREATIVE SOCITIES (GENERAL)

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Admit. Government Pleader takes notice for respondents 1 and 2. Notice to respondents 3 and 4 is dispensed with, for, it is unnecessary to issue notice to the said respondents for resolving the issue raised by the petitioner in the writ petition. As agreed to by the counsel on either side, the writ petition is disposed of by this judgment at the admission stage itself.

(2.) The petitioner is a co-operative society registered under the Kerala Co-operative Societies Act ('the Societies Act'). The third respondent was a former collection agent of the petitioner. It is alleged by the petitioner that the fourth respondent is a friend of the third respondent. Exts.P3(a), P4(a) and P6(a) are applications preferred jointly and severally by respondents 3 and 4 before the first respondent under the Right to Information Act ('the RTI Act'). Ext.P5(a) is another application preferred by the third respondent before the second respondent under the RTI Act. Respondents 1 and 2 are authorities under the Societies Act having jurisdiction over the petitioner. The information sought in all the said applications are information relating to the petitioner and their customers. According to the petitioner, societies registered under the Societies Act are not public authorities under the RTI Act and therefore only information which respondents 1 and 2 are empowered under the Societies Act to require and maintain in respect of the petitioner can be furnished on applications for information preferred before them under the RTI Act. It is also their case that if those information are information which are being treated by the petitioner as confidential, the same can be furnished under the RTI Act only after complying with the procedure prescribed under section 11 of the RTI Act. It is the specific case of the petitioner that the information sought by respondents 3 and 4 are not information which respondents 1 and 2 are empowered under the Societies Act to require and maintain in respect of the petitioner. Nevertheless, it is alleged that respondents 1 and 2 have directed the petitioner by Exts.P3 to P6 communications to furnish the information sought by respondents 3 and 4 so as to furnish the same in turn to respondents 3 and 4. The petitioner, therefore, challenges Exts.P3 to P6 communications in this writ petition.

(3.) Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner as also the learned Government Pleader.