AGARTALA, Jan 14 (IANS) - The Tripura government Friday made new appointments to the state's Information Commission constituted under the Right to Information (RTI) Act. But the move was rejected by the main Opposition Congress.
Former Tripura chief secretary Shashi Prakash and former principal secretary Shyamalima Banerjee, both retired IAS officers, have been appointed as chief information commissioner and information commissioner respectively, according to an official announcement.
Main Opposition Congress rejected the appointments, blaming the Left Front government for "appointment of yes-men in the constitutional body".
"The Left Front government has been selecting yes-men in the chairs of Information Commission to ensure illegal secrecy and suppress information from people to cover up corruption, misdeeds, nepotism and irregularities conducted in the government departments and other local government bodies," opposition leader Ratan Lal Nath told reporters.
Nath is one of the members of the three-member committee headed by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar to appoint the information commissioners on the state's Information Commission.
"There are several deserving officers in the state who can serve with excellence in the posts. The newly-appointed officials are non-residents of the state," he said.
"One of them (Shashi Prakash) even failed to render justice to a woman employee over a heinous allegation in his own tenure in the Tripura administration," Nath said.
"Eighteen out of 35 Indian states have appointed information commissioners in consensus with the opposition parties," he said.
