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Goa Information Commission declines release of ex-Guv Satya Pal Malik’s letters
Malik served as Goa Governor between November 2019 to August 2020 soon after his tenure in Jammu and Kashmir
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The Goa Information Commission has rejected an appeal against an order of the Goa Raj Bhavan which declined to furnish copies of letters written by then Goa Governor Satyapal Malik to the Prime Minister and home minister during his tenure as Goa Governor.
Information commissioner Vishwas Satarkar declined the plea in open court via a verbal order stating that the appeals were dismissed.
On October 11, 2021, advocate Aires Rodrigues, an activist, had sought under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, from Goa Raj Bhavan copies of all the official letters written by the then Governor Satya Pal Malik to the Prime Minister and home minister during his tenure in Goa from November 3, 2019 to August 18, 2020.
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However, in response to his request, the public information officer (PIO) Gaurish Shankhwalkar stated that letters were not available despite it being searched.
In another application advocate Rodrigues had sought a copy of all the official letters received by the Goa Governor from the Prime Minister and union home minister from November 3, 2019 to August 18, 2020 which also pertained to the period when Satya Pal Malik was Governor of Goa.
In response to the second request, the governor’s office stated that the official letters from Prime Minister and union home minister were all received in closed sealed envelopes and were handed over to governor’s personal secretary and as such the letters were not made part of the records and files of his office and, as such the information sought was not available with him.
“It is a fact that these letters are there. An inspection of the inward and outward registers of the Raj Bhavan revealed that there were letters written by then Governor Satya Pal Malik to the Prime Minister and union home minister and letters received by the Governor from them. The former Governor has also now publicly confirmed that he had written those letters,” Rodrigues said, adding that he will be challenging the denial of information before the high court after a copy of the information commissioner’s order is made available to him.
Malik served as Goa Governor between November 2019 to August 2020 soon after his tenure in Jammu and Kashmir.
