Author: Agencies
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: June 13, 2011
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/make-public-foreign-visit-details-of-sonia-gandhi-cic-to-pmo/803085/
The details of foreign visits undertaken by
National Advisory Council Chairperson Sonia Gandhi and expenses incurred on
them should be made public, the Central Information Commission has held.
Hissar-based RTI applicant Ramesh Verma had
sought to know from the PMO, information on the foreign visits of Sonia Gandhi,
the costs incurred on them, benefits and purpose of these visits.
"It seems Parliamentary Affairs ministry
had informed that the central government had incurred no expenditure on the
foreign visits of Sonia Gandhi during the last 10 years.
"However the Cabinet Secretariat has
no knowledge if any information has been given to the applicant in respect
of her foreign visits as Chairperson of the National Advisory Council,"
Mishra pointed out directing to provide details.
The application received by the PMO on February
26, 2010 was transferred to External Affairs Ministry on March 16, 2010 and
further forwarded to Parliamentary Affairs Ministry on March 26, 2010.
Pulling up the PMO for "casual handling"
of the RTI application in this regard, Chief Information Commissioner Satyananda
Mishra directed it to ensure, in future, that information seeking pleas should
be sent to concerned ministries only.
"One thing is for sure that, in this
case, the RTI request has been handled very casually. It was originally addressed
to the CPIO of the PMO. CPIO should have taken care to find out which exact
Ministry in the Central government was concerned and should have transferred
the application to that Ministry or Ministries.
"Instead, the application was forwarded
from one place to another, resulting in so much delay," he said.
