Times of India: Rajkot: Thursday, December 14, 2017.
How serious
is the BJP-led NDA government about promoting Right to Information (RTI) Act
brought by the previous UPA government?
If the
official figures of fund disbursement are anything to go by, there are serious
doubts about the government intentions to create awareness. The disbursement of
funds has drastically reduced from Rs 18 crore in 2013-14 to just Rs 5.82 crore
in 2016-2017.
A portion of
these funds are released by the Centre as per requirement placed by the state
governments to carry out awareness and training programme regarding RTI.
What's more
appalling is that Gujarat has not got a single penny in the last two years from
the Modi government to promote RTI. The figures were provided in an RTI
application filed by city-based activist Shailendrasinh Jadeja.
"Such a
drastric reduction in disbursement of funds shows that the government is
reluctant to create awareness about an Act which can expose them. The state
government has also been careless because they have to raise the demand for the
funds, which it has not done," said Jadeja.
In contrast,
the neighbouring BJP-ruled Maharashtra government received Rs 55 lakh in
2016-17 for the programme. Several RTI applicants have been complaining that
they queries are not replied to in a time-bound manner or even suppressed.
Bharatinsh
Zala, an RTI activist, said, "The state government has totally failed to
implement RTI Act in the right earnest. I was denied information of salary and
perks of ministers and expenses of the chief minister and other ministers
despite a government resolution of 2002 to make this information public."