| All Private Organizations
|
Private business organizations and institutions,
beware of the Right to Information Act. Your information can be at stake of
becoming public. Someone somewhere may be asking for your details under the
Right to Information Act and, you may have to reveal it or some agency of
governance having your information may be thinking of giving it to public on
demand under the Right to Information Act. You can be affected in three
different ways:
|
| First. |
You may not know but your organization may
itself be a direct subject matter of the Right to Information Act. You as an
organization may be treated as parallel to any organization of governance in
the Country directly subjected to the Right to Information Act. This can happen
if your organization is using or utilizing funds provided by Government either
directly or indirectly. For detailed understanding of this possibility, refer
to our section “Private Organizations – Finaced by Government” from the home
page or Click Here. |
| Second |
Every private organization operating in the
Country is subjected to a variety of Rules and Regulations under various Laws
of the Land. And, each such Law has some control over your organization. And,
under this control, the Government organization or department enforcing the Law
has access to your organization, your records and your information may be
including access to your premises. Whatever this Government department or
organization can access from you in the course of implementing the provisions
of the particular Law of the Land, is ‘Information' within the meaning assigned
to it under the Right to Information Act. And, any citizen can request to
obtain these information from the particular enforcing Government department or
organization in respect of your private organization. Information has been
defined in the Right to Information Act in Section 2(f) and reads as follows:
|
|
|
"information" means any material in any form,
including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press
releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples,
models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to
any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other
law for the time being in force; (stress provided)
|
|
It is the latter portion of this definition
highlighted for your convenience that makes your information susceptible to be
made public. Of-course, there are safeguards provided in the Act. Whenever such
a situation arises, that is, a citizen asks for your information from any
authority of the Government having some control over your organization, the
Public Information Officer of that Government organization shall treat your
organization as a third party and shall give an opportunity to object against
supply of your information. If such a situation arises, you get only ten days
time to make representation. The circumstances and situations in which it is
possible to defend and refrain the Public Information officer from supplying
the information to the person requesting it will depend upon facts of each
case. It also matters how the issues are put up before the Public Information
officer. If you consider any information of yours to be sensitive to your
business or your activity, you must plan in advance how to defend your case
because when the issue will crop up you may not have adequate time to be
thorough about it.
|
Of-course InfoRightIndia is there to bail you
out to the extent possible. For any clarifications on the issue, you may
contact us by clicking here.
You may also avail of our training facility to get educated and plan in advance
by clicking here. |
| Third |
| A positive point |
If a citizen of India can think of having access
to information about a private organization, you can also think of seeking
information about your well wishers and competitors. InfoRightIndia shall guide
you how to proceed. If you are interested click here
|
Every Industry operates in an environment and is
dependent on the environment in a variety of ways. Some instances of dependence
are:
|
| 1. Working Capital loans from Commercial Banks |
| 2. Long Term finance from Financial Institutions
|
| 3. Plethora of Laws ready to pin you down |
| 4. The nuisance of ‘departmental' visitors asking for their doll |
|
Infact, right from formation of the Company,
acquiring of land, passing of construction maps to actual production and till
you finalize your accounts, and even beyond till finalization of your returns
with may be income tax or excise, some or the other problem keeps coming time
and again. If we visualize the problem and think about it, we shall realize
that we perceive it as a problem primarily because of our ignorance and
unawareness.
|
| INSPECTORS |
An Inspector from the pollution control department
knocks at your door and you get perturbed. Why? Most likely because you are not
aware of several things:
| a. Has he come officially, and, how to ensure that |
| b. What are his powers in the course of his visit |
| c. What harm can he do to you; etc etc |
|
The Right to Information Act can come to your
rescue. As an industry, a confederation or even as a small group, you can
request for information from the pollution control department about the
following, in addition to many others:
| 1. Is there a system of deputing Inspectors for on the spot
verification |
|
2. What is the system and what is the basis |
| 3. Schedule of visits of Inspectors for the next three months |
| 4. What are the powers of these Inspectors in the course of the
visit Etc. etc. |
|
The moment these information are asked for, the
department on the one hand becomes cautious and on the other hand if they have
been operating in an ad-hoc manner, shall streamline their systems.
|
| Banks and Financial Institutions |
|
If your application for loan etc.has to be
filed, should you not know the norms first. So far these have been kept secret
by the banks and institutions. Our community, the CAs have known them
unofficially and have been exploiting the industry with demands in the names of
officers. The Right to Information Act gives us the power to ask for these
guidelines. Very often, one application is cleared and the other is rejected.
Frequently, the application filed latter is processed first. Under the Act, the
position with regard to all this can be made clear and you can escape the wrath
of such manipulations. You file your application and simultaneously file a
request application under the Right to Information Act asking the bank to give
details of pending applications. And, you know your position. You ask for
reasons of rejection recorded in your file. And see the difference
|
| COMPETITORS |
You wish to know secrets of your competitors? It
may be possible. For instance, the profitability, the raw material
combinations, their quality, and may be the details of creditors and debtors.
Even their rates of purchase and sales may be possible. There are provisions in
the Act under which such data can be obtained. It may not be easy but it is
possible. And, if you wish to remain in the background, even that is possible.
|
| CAUTION |
By the same logic, your data is also at risk.
Someone may be eyeing for details about you. So be cautious. What we have
talked about is only tip of the gamut which should give you an idea of what is
possible under this Act. It should start your thinking process and wherever you
get stuck up, we are there to help you out.
|
| |