Business Standard: Kupwara (Jammu
and Kashmir): Friday, March 03, 2017.
Seeking to
make Kupwara a "model RTI" district, the District Administration has
invited the Jammu and Kashmir RTI Movement (J & K RTIM) and the
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) to provide technical assistance to
public authorities for implementing the J&K Right to Information Act, 2009.
Incidentally,
J&K RTIM and CHRI are already working with stakeholders in Kulgam to make
it a model RTI district in response to a similar invitation extended by Shri M
Y Tarigami, Member of Legislative Assembly, Kulgam.
In his
opening remarks at the one-day training workshop on the J&K RTI Act
organised at Kupwara earlier today, Mr. Hafeez Ahmed Shah, Additional Deputy
Commissioner admitted that the bureaucratic attitude of the public authorities
was partly responsible for the inadequacies in the implementation of this
people-empowering law. He also pointed out that some citizens and 'activists'
in Kupwara were using the RTI Act to intimidate officers, which was
unfortunately showing genuine RTI activists promoting the public interest, in
poor light.
Mr. Shah
called upon the more than 70 PIOs and appellate authorities attending the
workshop, to not act as an impediment in giving effect to people right to know
what the government was doing. He urged them to work in a sensitive manner to
make RTI implementation a big success in the district. He also suggested that
civil society activists work with the district administration to ensure the
effective implementation of various developmental programmes and schemes
through the constructive use of RTI.
Dr. Shaikh
Ghulam Rasool, Chairperson, J&K RTI Movement and Co-Convenor, National
Campaign for People's Right to Information (NCRPI), explained the key
provisions of the J&K RTI Act to the participants placing special emphasis
on the requirement of proactive disclosure of information to the people. He
pointed out that volunteers of the J&K RTIM have always endeavored to use
RTI in a constructive manner.
Mr. Venkatesh
Nayak, Programme Coordinator, CHRI and Co-Convenor, NCPRI shared the latest
developments in RTI related case law from the Supreme Court and various High
Courts across the country while responding to the queries raised by PIOs about
the challenges they faced in implementing the J&K RTI Act in letter and
spirit.
The officers
participating in the workshop recommended that initiatives be taken urgently to
ensure that the latest developments in the case law on RTI are channelized to
PIOs and appellate authorities regularly to enable them to deal with RTI
applications and appeals effectively. They also recommended that an RTI Cell be
established at the district level to screen all RTI applications in order to
process them faster. Where information already supplied to an applicant under
the Act was sought by other citizens it should be possible to furnish the same
to them without delay. The RTI experts addressing the workshop recommended that
the district administration expand its official website to upload all RTI
applications and replies so that applicants seeking similar information may be
directed to the website to access the information quickly. CHRI and J&K RTI
Movement agreed to make formal submissions on these implementation issues to
the J&K State Government, the J&K General Administration Department and
the J&K State Information Commission.
The training
workshop was organised by the district administration in collaboration with Jan
Shikshan Sansthan (Anhad) Kupwara, J&K RTI Movement and CHRI.
The
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) is an independent, non-partisan,
international non-governmental organisation, mandated to ensure the practical
realisation of human rights in the countries of the Commonwealth.
.JPG)
.JPG)
