Mr. Rajdev Sharma of Akhnoor recently commented on his RTI blog on the fact that J&K Bank is declaring itself exempt from the RTI Act (as discovered by Muzaffar two weeks ago).  When querried about these comments by Muzaffar, J&K Bank Chairman Mr. Haseeb Drabu responded as follows (we are providing his response and points-of-correction below in due fairness to J&K Bank and Mr. Drabu).

Nonetheless, J&K Bank still fits the definition of a Public Authority under section 2(f)(iv)(A) of the J&K RTI Act 2009 on the basis of share ownership alone (53%), we therefore again ask J&K Bank to pro-actively fulfill its basic obligations under the RTI Act by appointing PIOs and APIOs.  If the J&K Bank’s history, fate, and fortunes were truly independent of the Government of Jammu & Kashmir, the Bank might have a valid moral and legal case that it does not fall under RTI.  But that is not the situation. We  ask Mr. Drabu to clearly tell us the Bank’s plans in regards to RTI.

Excerpt below:

“THE FACTUAL POSITION IS AS FOLLOWS

1. JK Bank – 53% STATE Govt stake: YES .
2. 7 Directors from JK govt: NO
,3. BANK Chairman appointed by JK Govt: NO
,4. Regd as a Govt Banking Company, : NO
5. State Govt Banker,YES
6. Employees only from JK State: PARTLY TRUE.
7. Govt Treasuries managed by the bank: PARTIALLY YES
8. 1800 JK Govt employees on deputation to the Bank: NOT AT LL.
9. Govt taken 2000 Crores Overdraft from the bank: YES
10 most of the branches in the Govt premises: NOT AT ALL
11. most of the ATMs in the Govt premises: NOT AT ALL

Since you are an information dissemination and transparency activist, you may do well look at our web site for the exact factual and technicall correct interpretative position. We belive and pride ourselves on the fact that our corporate disclosure level is the among the highest in India. No wonder that our annual report for 2009-10 has been nominated for 8 awards recently at the national level.
For the exact position of Rajdev sharma’s ill informed assertions pls check the link (About us) on our site:
http://www.jkbank.net/history.php “