The four Information Commissioners, whose nomination was ratified by the Governor, are yet to take up office, as the state government is yet to give its nod for them.
This is because Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy wants them to join duties only after the case of the remaining four nominees is settled. This has left S Prabhakar Reddy, retired police officer, Madhukar Raj, former IFS officer, Andhra Prabha editor Vijay Babu and retired IPS officer M Ratan.
According to an Indian Express report, Kiran is uncompromising on the issue and wants to send the file back once again to the Governor. However, he has not done this yet, as he wants to go ahead with this move only after the ongoing by-polls.
This precaution is to ensure that in case of the Governor returning the file once again, the issue will not become an election controversy.
{The New Indian Express}
HYDERABAD: Chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy is understood to have deferred a decision on what he should do regarding the appointment of eight information commissioners under Right to Information Act in wake of governor ESL Narasimhan returning file on February 21, taking objection to appointment of four of them.
The government sent the file to the governor on February 17 for his assent to the appointments but the governor returned the proposal in a sealed cover on Tuesday suggesting reconsideration of the four appointments of Varre Venkateswarlu, Lam Tantiya Kumari, Imtiaz Ahmed and M.Vijaya Nirmala since they have affiliation to the Congress.TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu, who participated in the selection process on January 31 and raised no objection to any of appointees, changed his stance later and sent a dissent note.According to sources, the chief minister, who does not want to admit defeat, has been considering sending the proposal to the governor once again for ratification, justifying the four appointments to whom the governor had taken objection.The chief minister, regardless of what the governor’s reaction will be, wants to send the file as it is. In view of the by-elections, he does not want to run the risk of raising the curtain for another controversy in case the file were to be rejected again.Though his supporters are confident that the governor cannot reject the file if it is sent for the second time.
