Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee led the Government of West Bengal to issue a notification for the appointment of new Information Commissioners to enhance administrative capacities of the state information commission in the state for faster case disposals.

The Supreme Court of India has recently directed Bengal, Odisha, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Nagaland, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Karnataka to fill up vacancies in the commissions within six months.

An official statement from a personnel and administrative reforms (PAR) department in West Bengal government said: “Nabanna started the process of appointment accordingly". According to the PAR official, after the retirement of former DGP, GMP Reddy, in May, the panel comprised chief information commissioner (CIC) Basudeb Banerjee and ex-IPS officer Raj Kanojia.

The official statement further added that former CIC Sujit Sarkar had earlier proposed appointing five commissioners to reduce the volume of pending cases. CIC Banerjee said the appointment of four more commissioners, as the SC had directed, would greatly help in handling cases.

He said the panel had held meetings with the state government for a bigger office as the current one at Khadya Bhavan was too small. He added that due to the pandemic, the process of appointment of three commissioners could not be executed.