The Hindu: Bengaluru: Friday, November 27, 2015.
Tired of
information officers in government agencies who take the Right to Information
Act applications lightly? Karnataka Information Commission (KIC) is now taking
the fight to the agencies directly by holding RTI Adalats on the premises of
civic agencies to ensure speedy disposal of appeals pending with the
commission. A first-of-its-kind initiative, being introduced a decade after the
RTI Act was enforced, has become necessary because of “indifferent” officers in
several government agencies, activists said. “In the city, the Bruhat Bengaluru
Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) and Bangalore
Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) are the biggest villains when it comes
to not providing information demanded. This adalat will put the principal information
officers as well as the applicants face to face, and escaping will not be that
easy. I think this is a great move,” said Wing Commander G.B. Athri (retd).
The move
comes as the KIC finds itself swamped with over 30,000 pending appeals,
necessitating each of the four Commissioners to listen to almost 30 cases
daily. The adalats will begin with the BBMP next month and then move to other
agencies such as the BDA and Karnataka Industrial Areas Development Board
(KIADB).
“A lot of the
appeals before the commission that are from Bengaluru are related to the BBMP,
BDA or the KIADB. From next month, we will start dealing with cases related to
the BBMP. The idea is to dispose of 372 urgent appeals in a phased manner
across zones, and if this is a success, we will think of holding more such
adalats,” said L. Krishnamurthy, State Information Commissioner.
In the
schedule which has been worked out by the Commission, the highest number of
appeals 109 will be heard at the office of the Joint Commissioner, BBMP head
office, on December 7. “We are currently in the process of sifting through the
30,000 pending appeals and categorising those from the city under three heads BBMP,
BDA and KIADB. Once we get these appeals sorted, we will have more such adalats
in the future,” Mr. Krishnamurthy said.
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