Dear Sarbajit,
I think you are reading too much into OPK's decision. Nowehere is the second
inference you have drawn implied. the only implication is rarest of rare cases.
even this is unacceptable because there are no criteria for such cases. When
his ruling is seen in the totality of the decision he is frowning upon the
practice of asking citizenship rpoof. or else he would not have said "thousands
of applications are being considered without asking for proof of citizenship.
he also exhorts PIOs to go with the spirit of the Act. if your second inference
is true then your first inference does not make sense at all. if proof of
citizenship is made mandatory then it should be sought at the application stage
itself. if not it would be arbitrary. the act of exercising the right to
information begins when the application is written and posted to the PIO. if
citizenship proof is sought only while giving information then it becomes a
conditional right, b'coz the decision to refuse access will
be made without going into citizenship issues. This will go against article 14
I believe. but when the government does not have a credible system of providing
identity cards to all citizens in India will a citizen have to manufacture a
proof of citizenship to seek information until the government gives him one?
after all such documents are not property of the citizen. they are the proprty
of the authority issuing the card. and there is no legal compulsion on a
citizen to possess proof of citizenship. he needs it only in order to exercise
certain kinds of rights and get some entitlements or apply for some
opportunities. We would be going in for fascist or communist state if
everybody is forced to have and carry citizenship cards. it will be nazi
germany and stalinist russia all over again.
Thanks
Venkat
sroy1947 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Dear Nidhi,
Many of us have to draft our texts as carefully as IC OPK:-)
Here is what I said;-
1) It is NOT OK for a PIO to seek /demand proof of citizenship at time
of receiving application.
2) It is OK for PIO to seek /demand such proof at time of releasing /
intimating the disclosure of information.
In my own case the PIO of SC recently refused to accept Rs.10
application fee till we gave photo ID proof of Government that we are
Indian citizens.
Sarbajit
--- In [email protected], Nidhi Sharma <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Thanks a lot everyone for this response. But somehow I do not agree
with Sarbajit's justification of this. When it is not a mandatory
document required along with the application (which is given on a
plain paper), then why should this be demanded by the PIO? It could be
only in the rarest of rare cases when there is doubt about
nationality. Thankfully it has been put on record by IC OPK with a
carefully worded decision.
>
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