Information Commissioner keeps mum

K.H. Ramalinga Reddy, an RTI activist who found discrepancies with the information commissioner L. Krishnamurthy’s educational profile filed an RTI application to get the certified copies of the commissioner’s degree certificates and marks cards. Mr. Reddy was baffled to see that L. Krishnamurthy claimed that he was a BA graduate in his curriculum vitae that is put up on the website of the Karnataka Information Commission (KIC) website, but he had mentioned that he was a postgraduate in a document with the Janaspandana DPAR.

“Suspecting there could be a possibility of a foul play, I sought under RTI, certified copies of the commissioner’s merit list, gazette notification/paper notification pertaining to his appointment, application form and bio-data submitted by him during appointment, caste certificate, income certificate, character certificate, police verification certificate pertaining to criminal antecedents, medical fitness certificate, SSLC, PUC, BA. Masters degree, marks cards, degree certificates, SSLC transfer certificate and bonds and affidavits if any furnished by him at the time of appointment,” said K.H. Ramalinga Reddy. But to the activist’s dismay, the commissioner’s public information official (PIO) Srilatha Kotemutt bluntly replied ‘information unavailable.’

The commission that was set up to ensure transparency in Right To Information system itself is not transparent, said Mr. Reddy adding that “According to section 6(3) under RTI Act the PIO must ideally transfer the RTI application to the office where the information is available if its not available with the PIO’s office,” said Mr. Reddy. Several calls made to the information commissioner L. Krishnamurthy’s phone went unanswered.