That a citizen who has been unjustly denied his Right to Information or has been provided with wrongful or misleading information should be given Compensation for the trauma he suffered or the loss he incurred in the process of his laborious search for information, was emphasized by both Ms. Sunita Patnaik of CYSD and Ms. Biraj Swain of CARE, Orissa on the basis of the deliberations, which were held in the two Consultations organized respective by them earlier. While pleading for a new provision to be added in the Draft Bill in the aforesaid light, both of them said that the amount of Compensation that the aggrieved citizen would be entitled to, would be realised from the guilty public servant out of the penalty charged against him.
Mr. Biswaranjan Behera of SODA, Baripada stressed the need for the Draft Bill to specify the mechanism of collection and payment of the Compensation.
The recommendation was that the penalty of Rs.200/- per day to be realized from the defaulter public servant account of delay in information, is to be paid to the aggrieved information-seeker, while the appellate authority shall, while fixing the penalty on account of false or forged information on the basis of the existing provisions of IPC, determine the amount of Compensation to be paid to the citizen so aggrieved.