Two information commissioners on Wednesday postponed the hearing of appeals till the government clears the air on the constitution of benches at the panel.
Information commissioners A.N. Tiwari and Deepak Sandhu did not carry out hearings on Wednesday while the chief information commissioner Wajahat Habibullah was
out of station. When contacted, offices of both the commissioners confirmed that hearings have been advanced because of last week’s Delhi high court decision on the working of the transparency panel. Meanwhile, the rest of the commissioners carried out hearings of scheduled cases.
Mr Ramesh Tripathi, whose case was scheduled for hearing before Mr Tiwari through video-conferencing from Jharsuguda, Orissa, said he travelled nearly 40 km for the hearing only to be told that it has been postponed.
“My appeal was against an RTI reply sent by Coal India. I was scheduled to report at 11 am today. But I was told that the hearing has been postponed without giving any reasons,” said Mr Tripathi.
However, before leaving Delhi, Mr Habibullah had convened a meeting of all the information commissioners on Tuesday to discuss the repercussions of the high court decision where some commissioners have expressed reservations over continuing hearing of appeals.
They had said continuation of work would mean contempt of court.