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ShareNew Delhi: The CIC today directed the Union home ministry to disclose all its records used by the justice Mukherjee Commission to probe the alleged disappearance of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose in 1945.
Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah, however, reserved his verdict on making public documents relating to the issue which belonged to other ministries, state governments and Prime Minister's Office. These documents are currently in possession of the home ministry.
He said while the onus to disclose them, under the RTI Act, lies on the "holder" of the document, which at present is the home ministry and not any other ministries, he would look at court decisions and provisions under the law in this regard before giving his ruling.
The decision comes 33 months after Chandrachur Ghose, an executive with a private firm, filed his application seeking disclosure of exhibits listed in the justice Mukherjee Commission report.
The home ministry had earlier been reluctant on disclosure of documents despite orders of the CIC which questioned representatives of the ministry for the delay.
The ministry officials contended that process of transferring these documents to National Archives of India is on even as Habibullah warned that this could not go on indefinitely.
"There should be some reasonable time for the declassification. You cannot keep doing it for 50 odd years," he pointed out.
Joint Secretary Lokesh Jha, representing the home ministry, said the documents are voluminous and have been kept in 22 trunks, and much of these documents belong to the ministry.
He said the ministry has no problem in disclosing the documents pertaining to it, but it was not possible to provide papers of other ministries and PMO as they want their records back.
The MHA asked the appellant to give it a list of documents sought by him and accordingly a copy of those could be provided.
Habibullah also asked Ghose to give the list so that the order can be carried out expeditiously.
Exercising his right to information, Ghose had filed his application on November 22, 2006 seeking all the exhibits listed in the report of the Mukherjee Commission.
But the ministry sought six months saying the documents were voluminous in nature, a plea which was rejected by CIC.
"The ministry has cited one excuse or the other. It is a kind of denial without saying so. Why are they coming with new excuses every time?" Ghose asked.
The one-man commission was set up in 1999 to go into the controversy surrounding the disappearance of Subhas Chandra Bose in 1945.
