The appellant Mr.Maniram Sharma has filed seven appeals and a complaint against Department of Legal Affairs and Department of Justice, Government of India for not replying to his queries under Right to Information Act. The appellant was heard by Central Information Commission (CIC) through audio conference on 10-06-2014 and the decision was announced on 20-06-2014.
Earlier, the appellant filed several RTI applications between December 2012 to March 2013 seeking to know concerned Department’s opinions, letters presented and received, etc. noting, decision and action taken on First to 244th Report of Law Commission and noting and action taken on his letter, Appellant also referred to the Central Secretariat Manual Procedure, para 90, which states that the important decisions of the Department have to be uploaded in the website. The appellant also gave suggestions with regard to use of Official Language in Government offices, issuing of letters/directions/orders/notifications in Hindi language and uploading of the Law Commission Reports Bilingually. He also sought establishment of e-library.
The CIC while announcing decision on the appeals expressed the following important views;
Various Law Commissions under richly experienced Judges of Supreme Court as chairpersons,with pain-staking research have come out with significant recommendations on highly relevant topics pertinent to the people’s rights hoping immediate action of the Government to reform the concerned law. But it is unfortunate that the Governments of the day did not show enough regard and response to the Reports and respect to their authors. They either deferred their decision or confined Reports to cold storage.
The Government has enough power and authority even to reject the recommendations of the Law Commission with valid reasons after serious consideration. Because of this the reports of Law Commission became subject matters of seminars and symposia among academia only. In the process, the enormous efforts and hard-work of researchers were not appropriately utilized for reforming the law. As the decades rolled out,certain recommendations might have become obsolete or irrelevant.
At least the Government should have expressed its opinion and informed back the Law Commission Chairman. This means the people in general and the Law Commission Chairmen (and Members) in particular were denied their right to know the Government’s opinions,discussions or actions on those Reports.
The appellant has rightly brought out the issue which was felt by many law persons and experts through his applications under RTI.
Directions issued by CIC:
Among others, the CIC gave the following important directions to the concerned departments:
Direction to upload the tracking of the movement of Government’s response on the Law Commission reports by the side of each Report along with Department’s action taken report thereon, on the websites of the Law Commission and concerned Ministry/departmentof Union Government within 45 days.
Direction to Department of Legal Affairs to complete the task of uploading the Hindi version of Law Commission Reports within three months
Direction to the Department of Legal Affairs to complete the task of uploading the Hindi version of Law Commission Reports within three months.
Direction to inform about steps initiated to invite tenders for National e-Law Library, within two months
It is notable that following the directives of CIC, Ministry of Corporate Affairs has already uploaded to its website information containing action taken by the Ministry on 143th report of Law Commission of India on legislative safeguards or protecting the small depositors from exploitation. Read full information >>
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