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“Persons with Benchmark Disabilities (PwBD) including visual impairment/blindness, is categorically provided by SEBI in their Advertisement for recruitment of Officers in Grade A.”: SEBI.

The appellate authority under the RTI (Right to Information) Act of the Securities and Exchange Board of India comprising of Mr. Anand Baiwar adjudicated in the matter of Sujeet Kumar v CPIO, SEBI, Mumbai (Appeal No. 4350 of 2021) dealt with an issue in connection with Section 2 (f) of the Right to Information Act, 2005.

The appellant, Mr Sujeet Kumar had filed an application via RTI MIS Portal on the 25th of May, 2021 under the Right to Information Act, 2005. The respondent responded to the application by a letter on the 16th of June, 2021, filed by the appellate. After receiving a letter from the respondent on 16th of June, 2021, on his application, the appellate decided to file an appeal on the 19th of June, 2021. In his application, the appellate was seeking the following information:

“1) Are color blind persons eligible to join SEBI as Grade A ? SEBI accept color blind persons or not because it is mandatory in only defence.”

The respondent, in response to the queries, informed that the same are in the nature of seeking clarification/opinion and accordingly, cannot be construed as seeking “information” as defined under section 2(f) of the RTI Act

The appellant has filed the appeal on the ground that the information provided was incomplete, misleading or false. On perusal of the appeal, it appears that the appellant is not satisfied with the reply to query number 1.

For the query, the appellate authority, Mr Anand Baiwar, made reference to the matter of Hon’ble CIC, in the matter of Vineet Pandey vs. CPIO, United India Insurance Company Limited (Judgment dated January 21, 2021), wherein similar observations were made by the Hon’ble CIC. Further, in the matter of Shri Shantaram Walavalkar vs. CPIO, SEBI (Decision dated January 17, 2013), it was noted that the Hon’ble CIC held: “… we would also like to observe that, under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the citizen has the responsibility to specify the exact information he wants; he is not supposed to seek any opinion or comments or clarifications or interpretations from the CPIO…”. In view of these observations, the appellate authority found no deficiency in the response.

In view of the above-made observations, the Appeal was accordingly dismissed since the appellate authority found that there was no need to interfere with the decision of the respondent.

Click here to read the entire order.

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