The Central Information Commission has sought documents related to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's international trips. This came after the Ministry of External Affairs turned down a Right To Information application on the same citing security reasons, PTI reported on Friday. Commodore (retired) Lokesh Batra had filed an RTI query seeking details about the cost incurred on the prime minister’s foreign trips.

Chief Information Commissioner Radha Krishna Mathur said that "without perusal of the files" it cannot be decided if the information sought contained security-related information. Mathur directed the Ministry of External Affairs to submit one representative file.

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The RTI applicant said the information sought had significant public interest as it involved the "taxpayers' money". Batra told the information commission that until September 2016, the prime minister's office website displayed bill payments for trips made by Modi, between June 15, 2014 and September 8, 2016, as "under process" or "not received".

Batra claimed national carrier Air India has been bearing the brunt of a "delay in payments" for the prime minister's visits to over 40 countries, since he was elected to the Prime Minister's office in 2014, NDTV reported. He said, "Air India is in a deep financial crisis and I wanted to know why it takes so long to clear bills to the national carrier under different regimes."

Batra said the application asked for details about the expenditure incurred on the international air travel of the current and former prime ministers, the procedure followed in charting flights for the prime minister’s trips, process of filing for “flight returns” and the billing procedure for the same.

Modi has been criticised for making numerous trips abroad at the taxpayer's expense. On August 5, Minister of State for External Affairs V K Singh told Rajya Sabha members that Rs 6.4 crore was spent on just event management during the 51 foreign visits that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made since he was elected to power. The Centre has defended the trips, calling them an execution of India's foreign policy.