MEGHNA RUBY KACHHAP Vs. STATE OF JHARKHAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Petitioner has approached this Court challenging order dated 24.09.2012 in Appeal No. 2672 of 2011 passed by the Chief Information Commissioner, Government of Jharkhand, Ranchi. The brief facts of the case as disclosed in the writ petition are that, the petitioner is posted as Block Development Officer at Birni, district Giridih. On 19.07.2011 an application under the Right to information Act, 2005 (for short 'the Act') was submitted by one Bhuvneshwar Modi seeking various informations relating to the persons who are availing of old age pension. Since the informations sought for was so extensive that it was not possible for the Public Information Officer to provide the same within the statutory period, however, on 14.10.2011 certain informations along with pension verification report were provided to the applicant. The applicant namely, Bhuvneshwar Modi approached the Deputy Commissioner, Giridih seeking a direction for providing information to him and thereafter, he preferred Appeal No. 2672 of 2011 in which by order dated 24.09.2012 a penalty of Rs. 10,000/- has been imposed upon the petitioner, and therefore, the petitioner has approached this Court filing the present writ petition.

(2.) Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and respondent-State of Jharkhand.

(3.) The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner has submitted that the informations sought by the applicant are so extensive that it was not possible to supply all the informations within the statutory period of 30 days. The applicant has sought for such diverse informations which required great efforts for collecting and providing those informations to the applicant. He has further submitted that, in fact the informations sought by the applicant are not in public interest rather, the applicant used to harass public authorities and others on the pretext of seeking informations in public interest. The learned counsel for the petitioner has further submitted that the procedure as prescribed under the Act has not been followed by the Chief Information Commissioner and a penalty of Rs. 10,000/- has been imposed upon the petitioner which is not justified and cannot be sustained in law.