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Sreedhar Sunkara   10 April 2021

Rti rejected because third part information

Hello Members, 

   I am facing harassment from my neighbor, I have constructed a new house, and the neighbor is jealous about my growth. They started filing false complaints before municipal commissioners which are subsequently made false by the same office. Later they filed a complaint to the Income-tax commissioner with false information, here in the span of 1 week the same subject with a different version was filed before the IT commissioner and Prinicipal civil judge court.  

   Now here I have a problem, 

  1. I have a copy of the complaint filed in court, as the court gave me a summons along with a complaint copy. 
  2. I applied for a complaint copy under the RTI act before the IT commissioner but his office rejected my application stating I am a third party. 
  3. The IT commissioner forwarded the same complaint to the SP of police (my father retired as a police officer), The police department also rejected my RTI application stating I have asked for third-party information which is not under the scope of RTI. 

 But actually, I am Respondent and I received notice from the IT investigation wing and appeared before it. I was asked to submit some more documents. I need the advice to get an RTI copy. How can complain against me third-party information as per the public information officer?



Learning

 2 Replies

Ishaan   23 April 2021

Even Though the principle of maximum disclosure underpins all RTI laws, it is acknowledged that the right to information is not absolute. Not all information that any organisation or authority generates will or should be given out to the public. There are some pieces of information, which are so sensitive that if they were released to the public, they might actually cause serious harm to important interests. All RTI laws includes provisions that allow certain types of information to be withheld from the public. These provisions are commonly called "exemption provisions". In the Central Act these exemptions are found in Section 8(1).
Even more importantly, Section 8(2) of the Central Act makes all of the exemptions contained in section 8 (1) of the Act subject to a "Public Interest Override". What this means, in practice, is that even where requested information is covered by an exemption, you should still disclose it to the applicant if the public interest in the specific case requires it.
A reason for rejection might be that the question was not formed properly for example - ‘Why have I not got admission?’ is not asking for information, whereas ‘I want the cut-off marks at which admission was granted’ is asking for information.
Section 11 gives only an 'opportunity' to the third party to raise its concern to disclosing information: "Section 11 (1) clearly states that submission of third party shall be kept in view while taking a decision about disclosure of information."
However, the third party's denial cannot be the last word as section 11 does not give a third party an unrestricted veto to deny disclosing information. It clearly foresees situations where the PIO will not agree with the claim for non-disclosure by a third party and provides for an appeal to be made by the third party against disclosure, which would have been unwarranted, if the third party had been given a veto against discovery. Thus, the PIO is required to follow the procedure of Section 11, when he intends to disclose the information concerned but has some reason to believe that the third party treats it as confidential. If the third party sends an objection, the PIO has to determine whether the information is exempt under the provisions of the Act.
 

Sreedhar Sunkara   24 April 2021

Thanks for the reply, can you please elaborate on what is an option I have to get this copy. The complainant gave a false complaint to the income tax comissioner to audit our accounts, at the same time she prayed before the civil court that we did not pay income tax come and we should be audited. the version of the complaint is different from one another. 

   One can not harass others with malicious intention miss guiding government and courts. should I go for appeal?  


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