HC judge, journalists among 161 applicants for 8 vacancies at CIC

The government has received 161 applications for eight vacant positions of Information Commissioners at the Central Information Commission with applicants from varied backgrounds including a sitting Delhi High Court Judge expressing interest in the job, according to a DoPT list.

The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has given the list of 161 applicants in response to an RTI query filed by Commodore Lokesh Batra (retd).

The list contains names of Justice Anoop Kumar Mendiratta of Delhi High Court, Special Commissioner Delhi Police Rajender Pal Upadhyay, serving and retired officers from armed forces -- Lt Gen Jaiveer Singh Negi, Group Captain Praveen Shukla, Capt (IN) Abhay Kumar Paluskar, Lt Gen Paramjit Singh Minhas, Lt Gen Manoj Kumar Mago, Lt Gen Harsha Gupta, Lt Gen PR Venkatesh, Lt Gen Ranbir Singh Salaria among others.

Journalist GK Suresh Babu associated with Janam TV from Thiruvananthapuram, retired Professor of Political Science from Mysore University Muzaffar Hussein Assadi are also among the applicants.

Former Indian Forest Service Officer Pankaj Asthana, Ajay Bhatnagar are also among the 161 applicants.

The Central Information Commission has one Chief Information Commissioner and 10 Information Commissioners. The transparency watchdog has eight vacant positions of Information Commissioners.

The CIC is the highest appellate authority in the RTI matters with powers to levy penalties upto Rs 25,000 on government officers who do not furnish responses to RTI petitions in a timely manner or violate provisions of the law.

The Department of Personnel and Training had issued advertisement seeking applications for the post of eight Information Commissioners on August 14 this year.

According to the procedure in the Right to Information Act, particulars of interested persons are invited through advertisements in newspapers and through the DoPT Website.

The names of applicants are sent to a search committee (constituted by the Prime Minister) and chaired by the Cabinet Secretary.

Names of all the candidates including the shortlisted ones along with their applications is sent to the Committee headed by the Prime Minister which also includes Leader of the Opposition, and a Union Cabinet Minister nominated by the prime minister.

The names cleared by the three-member committee are appointed by the President for a period of five years or the age of 65 years, whichever is earlier.