BackCIDC answerable under the RTI Act: CIC
The CIDC website describes it as being set up by the Planning Commission with the construction industry
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New Delhi: The Construction Industry Development Council (CIDC) comes under the Right to Information Act, Central Information Commission (CIC) has held, rejecting the CIDC’s contention that it was a society, independent of any government funding and not covered under the transparency law. The CIDC website describes it as being set up by the erstwhile Planning Commission jointly with the construction industry to take up activities for the development of the Indian construction industry.
The case relates to an RTI query filed by activist Subhash Agrawal, who did not get any response to his queries related to file notings on setting up of CIDC by the Planning Commission.
The CIDC was not responding to the RTI application. In a hearing before the CIC’s full bench, it claimed it was a society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 formed by various constituents of construction industry primarily comprising construction companies and industry associations as per orders of the Planning Commission.
Although CIDC was started with a corpus from the Planning Commission, it claimed that it has now attained self-sufficiency in funds and independent of any government funding and therefore cannot be termed as public authority under the RTI Act. The bench comprising the chief information commissioner Vijai Sharma and information commissioners Sharat Sabharwal and Yashovardhan Azad, said it has been stated by the CIDC that the annual reports of CIDC are presented in Parliament, which indicates that the government exercises control over CIDC. “The records reveal that the CIDC officers are making use of the Planning Commission’s name i.e. by printing the name of ‘Planning Commission, Government of India’ on their visiting cards, as does the website," it said.
The bench said there is unanimity of opinion that up to 2007, the chairman of the board of governors of the CIDC was nominated by the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission and that the chairman was also heading the managing committee of the CIDC.
“The Planning Commission continues to be a permanent member of the CIDC, with total exemptions regarding entrance and/or annual subscriptions. Presently, the Planning Commission is represented in CIDC’s governing body by advisor (Transport), Planning Commission," the bench said. It pointed out that 13 out of the 28 members of the CIDC governing body are either government servants or from some or the other government institution.
The bench said the monetary contributions from government organisations account as public money and aggregate to 36% of initial corpus ₹ 1.99 crore in 1988. “...out of the total corpus in 1998, 48% (by the Planning Commission) and 36% (government organisations)= 84% of the finance was contributed by the government directly or indirectly. This corpus aided the CIDC in building up its own infrastructure and the edifice of the petitioner’s substratum was built by such funding," it said. The bench said it cannot be argued by the CIDC that no substantial grant-in-aid is received and therefore it could not be regarded as “public authority".
“In the light of the foregoing discussion, the role of the government is evidently deep and pervasive in the respondent organisation right from its inception to funding, control and operations....We are of the considered opinion that the CIDC is substantially financed by the Central Government and is a fit organisation to be defined as ‘public authority’...under the RTI Act," the bench said.
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