The Central Information Commission (CIC) has been reconstituted with former law and justice secretary Raj Kumar Goyal being appointed as the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) and eight others as new Information Commissioners that include three women, the highest in recent years.
With this, the 11-member Central Information Commission (CIC) acquired full strength for the first time in the past seven years. The CIC was making do with only two information commissioners (ICs)—Anandi Ramalingam and Vinod Kumar Tiwari—with the eight posts of ICs vacant since Nov 2023.
The three newly-appointed woman Information Commissioners are former Railway Board Chairman Jaya Varma Sinha, Sudha Rani Relangi, who was a member of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board, and former IPS officer Swati Das, who has served in the home ministry as well as in the IB.
Besides, former Social Justice and Empowerment Secretary Surendra Singh Meena, former Indian Forest Service officer Khushwant Singh Sethi, former IAS officer Sanjeev Kumar Jindal, senior journalist PR Ramesh and Ashutlosh Chaturvedi are the other new members in CIC.
President Droupadi Murmu will be administering the oath to Goyal and the eight Information Commissioners on Dec 15 at 11 am.
Goyal is succeeding Heeralal Samariya, who relinquished office after reaching the age of 65. The CIC had become headless with the exit of Samariya, the first Dalit chief of the CIC, on September 13. It happened the seventh time in the last 11 years, with the government failing to find Samaria’s successor after Sep 13.
The filling of vacancies came after the three-member selection committee headed by PM Narendra Modi met on Dec 10 to decide the names of the new CIC, eight ICs, and a vigilance commissioner. Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi registered his strong dissent, but the govt later rebutted his claims. Home Minister Amit Shah was also part of the meeting.
The newly constituted CIC has a dominance of retired bureaucrats.
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