New Delhi: An auto rickshaw driver in Jaipur got the 39kg weighing documents in reply to an RTI query he filed some 20 years ago.
He did so for getting information on the 1.5 bigahs of his father's cultivable land which was acquired by Rajasthan State Industrial Development and Investment Corporation (RIICO) in Udaipur's Bhoiyon-ki-pancholi village.
The reason Shantilal, 47 years old, an illiterate auto driver filed three RTI applications was he suspected that there were others in the village whose land had not been acquired by RIICO.
He had filed the RTI applications in July-August last year for getting details of the total land acquired by RIICO for `colony development' in the area.
Shantilal has told that RIICO officials in Udaipur asked him to visit the office `to inspect documents'. They then allegedly threatened him and later sent him a notice seeking Rs 17,482 that were apparently incurred in photocopying his documents.
He remained undeterred and appealed to higher authorities at the office of RIICO in Udaipur.
Shantilal for getting exemption from any kind of charges had cited rule 3 and 4 of the RTI Act. For this, on September 17, 2015, the appellate officer ordered that Shantilal must be provided with all the requisite details free of charge.
But almost after four months he received 9,000 pages of reply on Wednesday to the information he had sought as his ordeal did not end.
Shantilal had to go to the post office in person to receive the documents as the postal department had refused to deliver the package to him saying that it was too heavy.
Shantilal has further told to a newspaper "The authorities humiliated and threatened me. They even asked what relevance the papers have for an `anpadh, ganvaar' person like me,"
Latest India News