The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Centre to fill vacant posts in the Central Information Commission within six weeks.
At present, there are three outstanding vacancies of Information Commissioners (CIC) that have not been filled up for the past one year. On November 6, the Delhi High Court had directed the Centre to fill up the posts within six weeks. Challenging this order, Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told apex court that already there are seven ICs and Right to Information Act does not require to have 10 ICs in place.
The apex bench of Justices JS Khehar and C Nagappan directed Centre to fill up the posts within six weeks. The Centre can either select from the pool of over 553 candidates who applied under the early notifications issued in February and July or under the latest notification of September 9.
The Government’s approach to delay appointments to the top Information panel had led three RTI activists RK Jain, SC Agarwal and lokesh Batra to approach HC in a PIl. Representing them in apex court, advocate Prashant Bhushan informed the bench that the Government could not be trusted to act promptly as is evident from its past conduct. The bench kept the matter pending to ensure its order was implemented.