FGG seeks Governor's intervention in appointment of CICs & ICs

Hyderabad: Stating that with all the five Information Commissioners demitting office after completing their term and the TS Information Commission was without any commissioner, the Forum for Good Governance (FGG) on Monday demanded the government to appoint new commissioners.

The FGG wrote to the Governor to intervene. The FGG secretary M Padmanabha Reddy said that a few months ago, the Information Commission office has represented to the government regarding demitting of all the commissioners on February 24 and requested to take appropriate steps for appointment of Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) and Information Commissioners (ICs). It appears that there is no response from the Government.

After the formation of Telangana State in the year 2014, the government should have taken steps to constitute an Information Commission and appointed Commissioners but the Government did not take any steps to appoint Commission and Commissioners. FGG made a number of representations for the Constitution of the Commission, as there was no response. The FGG filed a PIL in the High Court (PIL No. 164/2017). On the Court orders the Commission was constituted and CIC, ICs were appointed.

In the year 2020, CIC on completing his tenure has demitted office and since then the post of CIC is in additional charge of one of the existing ICs. There is a set procedure for appointment of CIC and other ICs. When the Government is aware of the demitting of office by all the Commissioners on February 24 government should have started preparatory work like constituting a search committee well in advance for preparation of a select list of candidates and submitted to the government. Section 15 (3) of the RTI Act says that 'CIC and the IC.s' should be appointed by the governor on the recommendation of a committee consisting of the Chief Minister who should be the chairperson and leader of the opposition in the Assembly and a cabinet minister.

"We have reason to believe that the Government is not interested in the functioning of the Information Commission and the RTI Act in the state of Telangana. For transparency and accountability and to control corruption in administration RTI Act should be properly implemented, said Padmanabha Reddy. "As the procedure for appointment of CIC and ICs is lengthy and time consuming, we request the governor to take immediate steps to appoint CIC and ICs urgently," said Reddy.