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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Plan panel withdraws RTI against Highways Ministry by Dipak Kumar Dash

Plan panel withdraws RTI against Highways Ministry by Dipak Kumar Dash

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published Published on Feb 17, 2010   modified Modified on Feb 17, 2010

In an unprecedented move, which could lead to simmering down the tension between the highways ministry and the Planning Commission, the principal adviser (infrastructure) in the planning panel Gajendra Haldea has withdrawn an RTI application seeking status of highway projects approved by Public Private Partnership Appraisal Committee (PPPAC).

The retired bureaucrat and a member of the PPPAC had filed the application before director (RTI) asking for status of NHAI projects approved by the PPPAC on Build Operate Transfer (BoT-Toll) basis between January 2006 and January 2010.

Ministry sources confirmed that Haldea withdrew the RTI application recently, which had become a serious issue between the ministry and the Plan panel. The issue was also reportedly taken up in the last meeting of empowered group of ministers (EGoM) on road, which has the Plan panel chief Montek Singh Ahluwalia, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee and highways minister Kamal Nath.

There were reports that Nath had written to Ahluwalia to intervene in the matter and that if nothing was done on this issue he would be forced to issue instructions to all officers in the Ministry and NHAI not to attend any meeting called by Haldea.

Highly placed sources said that Haldea could have got the information from the NHAI and hence has moved to withdraw the RTI application. However, Haldea refused to comment on the issue. "I have nothing to say on the RTI," he said.

In fact, how the issue had touched all time low was evident when Nath said at an infrastructure summit on Tuesday that arm-chair planners had no accountability to people and Parliament in his guided attack. However, he had excluded many members and advisors in the Planning Commission including B K Chaturvedi, who has appointed as the chairman of a high-powered committee on roads by the Prime Minister.

After the change of guard in the ministry, both NHAI and the ministry officials had singled out the Model Concession Agreement (MCA) prepared by Haldea as the major spoiler in the highway sector in the past two years.


The Times of India, 17 February, 2010, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Plan-panel-withdraws-RTI-against-Highways-Ministry/articleshow/5585379.cms
 

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