https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=264461 Government decision files constitute public records, and the Maharashtra Public Records Act, 2005 imposes a duty to preserve them and to act where records are unlawfully removed, destroyed or lost. The respondents could not treat the State Information Commission's direction to trace the missing file as optional or decide on their own not to lodge a complaint. Once the file could not be traced within the stipulated time, the statutory mandate required criminal law to be set in motion and the competent agency to investigate responsibility. The respondents were therefore bound to implement the Commission's direction, including registration of the criminal case, and their non-compliance was unjustified. en-us Fri, 27 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0530 Wed, 30 Dec 2015 18:31:00 +0530 TaxTMI RSS Generator https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=264461 Government decision files constitute public records, and the Maharashtra Public Records Act, 2005 imposes a duty to preserve them and to act where records are unlawfully removed, destroyed or lost. The respondents could not treat the State Information Commission's direction to trace the missing file as optional or decide on their own not to lodge a complaint. Once the file could not be traced within the stipulated time, the statutory mandate required criminal law to be set in motion and the competent agency to investigate responsibility. The respondents were therefore bound to implement the Commission's direction, including registration of the criminal case, and their non-compliance was unjustified. Case-Laws Indian Laws Fri, 27 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0530 https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=264461