The Central Information Commission (CIC), the country’s top transparency body under the Right to Information Act 2005, has resolved to take accountability to the public to new lengths.

Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah has decided to keep a record of complaints received against himself and his fellow Information Commissioners with the Commission Secretary for public access. So far, he admitted there had been no attempt on the part of the transparency panel to record complaints received against Information Commissioners.

Habibullah was deciding on a year-old RTI plea for details on complaints received against Information Commissioner A N Tiwari, who has been with the CIC since its inception.

He was careful to add that the CIC has no authority to take action on complaints against the Commissioners. As per the Act, the Chief Information Commissioner or an Information Commissioner can be removed only by an order of the President of India.

RTI applicant Mohammed Muzibur Rahman of Chhattisgarh, in June 2008, had sought certified copies of complaints and action taken on them by the Commission. The Commission had through then Central Public Information Officer Tarun Kumar responded that “no such information is maintained regarding complaints against Information Commissioner A N Tiwari”.

Habibullah took exception to Kumar’s reply to Rahman’s request for a full compilation of orders given by Tiwari in his capacity as Information Commissioner. Kumar, in his response, had asked Rahman to browse the Commission’s website for this purpose.

In his appeal to Habibullah, Rahman said he did not have access to the Internet and wanted the decision delivered at his home. Noting that his public information officer’s reply was “flawed”, Habibullah ordered his CPIO to “download all the decisions of Information Commissioner A N Tiwari on to a CD and provide the same to Mohammed Rahman free of cost within the next 10 working days”.