The ban on high denomination notes in November took 86% cash out of circulation.
The Finance Ministry has refused to disclose whether Union Minister Arun Jaitley was consulted before the notes ban announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 8, 2016. Earlier, the Prime Minister's Office and the Reserve Bank of India had claimed that the query whether the Finance Minister and the Chief Economic Advisor were consulted before the announcement does not come under the definition of "information" under the RTI Act.
The definition of "information" under the Act refers to "any material in any form" under the control of a public authority.
The Finance Ministry's response to the RTI query filed by Press Trust of India assumes significance as it acknowledges that there are records pertaining to the question but they cannot be disclosed under the Right to Information Act.
The Ministry has cited an exemption clause under the RTI Act to deny the information. It did not, however, give any reason as to how the information would attract the section.
The section allows withholding information the "disclosure of which would prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security, strategic, scientific or economic interests of the state, relation with foreign state or lead to incitement of an offence".
The three key institutions which are directly related to the move of demonetisation-- the PMO, the RBI and the Finance Ministry-- have refused to disclose information about the sudden measure. The Finance Ministry is the latest respondent.
The RTI Act has specific provision which allows records attracting its exemption clauses to be disclosed "if public interest in disclosure outweighs the harm to the protected interests".
"The clause of public interest would apply where exemption clause applies on the information sought by an applicant. In the present case, the information sought does not attract any exemption clause," former Central Information Commissioner Shailesh Gandhi told PTI.
He said the law is very clear: when a public authority refuses to disclose information, it must give clear reasons as to how the exemption clause would apply.
On the responses of the PMO and the RBI, former Chief Information Commissioner AN Tiwari had said their replies are wrong as the applicant had sought to know a fact which would be part of records hence an "information" under the RTI Act.
Notes of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 ceased to be legal tender after a surprise announcement by the PM on November 8 last year.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)