Recover costs from employees who challenged CIC order:Delhi HC

Taking a stern view of unnecessary litigation, Delhi High Court has directed the Government to recover Rs 10,000 from the salary of its officials for challenging a CIC order which directed them to pay the same amount as compensation to the National Law School for not complying with RTI Act.
Justice Manmohan said it has been averred that the respondent (RTI applicant Vansh Sharad Gupta) never filed an RTI application in the prescribed form and the requisite fee.
It is also stated that the respondent did not file the first appeal and hence the second appeal could not have been entertained by the CIC, he noted.

"This Court is not an appellate Court of the CIC. Technical and procedural arguments cannot be allowed to come in the way of substantial justice. The directions given by the CIC in the impugned order are not only fair and reasonable but also promote the concept of rule of law.
"It is unfortunate that the petitioner did not take the initiative on his own to upload the latest amended bare Acts," Justice Manmohan said upholding the order of Information Commissioner Sridhar Acharyulu.
He said this Court also takes judicial notice of the fact that in challenging the imposition of costs of Rs.10,000/-, the Government of India would have spent more money in filing the present writ petition.

"Consequently, this Court is of the view that the costs of Rs 10,000 which was directed to be paid by the CIC, should be recovered from the salary of the Government officials who authorised the filing of the present writ petition," he said.

He said public can be expected to follow the law only if law is easily accessible "at the click of a button".
"In fact, as rightly pointed out by the CIC, the RTI Act itself mandates the Government to place the texts of enactments in public domain," he said.
The case relates to email of Vansh Sharad Gupta, a law student at National Law School of India University, to Law Ministry wanting to know e-mail ID of CPIO, Legislative department.