Monday , Oct 26, 2009 at 0006 hrs
Ahmedabad : With the Gujarat government not filling up the posts of two information commissioners in the State Information Commission for the last two years, the number of applications is only piling up. And the people seeking information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act have been at the receiving end.
While the one-man commission headed by State Chief Information Commissioner R N Das has been able to dispose of a little over 5,000 cases, there is still a backlog of about 6,000 applications.
Although Das has been clearing about 350 cases a month
on an average, high inflow of cases from across the state are further adding to the backlog. According to Das, the commission has been receiving, on an average, 250 to 300 new applications every month.
“The huge inflow of cases is a good sign of awareness among the people of the state and their faith in RTI. This is despite the fact that it takes a long time to take up their cases due to the lack of hands in the commission,” said Das, adding, “It is also a fact that the commission is getting overburdened with this”.
In fact, the State Information Commission has been working as a one-man commission ever since it began operating on October 13, 2005. Even states much smaller than Gujarat, like Goa, with a total population of just 13 lakhs, have two information commissioners; Haryana has seven, Arunachal Pradesh eight and Punjab has 11.
“It is highly illogical to have a one-man information commission in Gujarat when its population exceeds 5.5 crore and a large number of RTI applications
are filed every month,” said Pankti Jog, coordinator of the Mahiti
Adhikar Gujarat Pahel (MAGP), an NGO working in the field of Right to Information.
She said a person could not hear over 15 to 20 cases a day and hence, it might take years to clear the backlog with regular inflow of new cases.
According to an official in the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), the government had two year’s ago sanctioned two more posts of information commissioner and made an annual budget for it. But the posts are yet to be filled up.
He said selection of the candidates had to be done by a committee headed by Chief Minister Narendra Modi with two members, including Leader of the Opposition Shaktisinh Gohil and State Revenue Minister Anandiben Patel.
When asked about the initiative taken by the committee in this regard, Gohil said it did not meet even once in the last two years. He said that he wrote
to the CM about it and also raised the issue in the budget session of the Assembly in July, but nothing was done.
According to MAGP, most of the RTI queries come from farmers. An analysis of the applications done by MAGP shows that farmers accounted for 16 per cent of the RTI queries specially about land issues, followed by teachers (11 per cent), small traders and businessmen (seven per cent), disabled persons(seven per cent) and daily wage workers (four per cent).
Ahmedabad : With the Gujarat government not filling up the posts of two information commissioners in the State Information Commission for the last two years, the number of applications is only piling up. And the people seeking information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act have been at the receiving end.
While the one-man commission headed by State Chief Information Commissioner R N Das has been able to dispose of a little over 5,000 cases, there is still a backlog of about 6,000 applications.
Although Das has been clearing about 350 cases a month
on an average, high inflow of cases from across the state are further adding to the backlog. According to Das, the commission has been receiving, on an average, 250 to 300 new applications every month.
“The huge inflow of cases is a good sign of awareness among the people of the state and their faith in RTI. This is despite the fact that it takes a long time to take up their cases due to the lack of hands in the commission,” said Das, adding, “It is also a fact that the commission is getting overburdened with this”.
In fact, the State Information Commission has been working as a one-man commission ever since it began operating on October 13, 2005. Even states much smaller than Gujarat, like Goa, with a total population of just 13 lakhs, have two information commissioners; Haryana has seven, Arunachal Pradesh eight and Punjab has 11.
“It is highly illogical to have a one-man information commission in Gujarat when its population exceeds 5.5 crore and a large number of RTI applications
are filed every month,” said Pankti Jog, coordinator of the Mahiti
Adhikar Gujarat Pahel (MAGP), an NGO working in the field of Right to Information.
She said a person could not hear over 15 to 20 cases a day and hence, it might take years to clear the backlog with regular inflow of new cases.
According to an official in the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), the government had two year’s ago sanctioned two more posts of information commissioner and made an annual budget for it. But the posts are yet to be filled up.
He said selection of the candidates had to be done by a committee headed by Chief Minister Narendra Modi with two members, including Leader of the Opposition Shaktisinh Gohil and State Revenue Minister Anandiben Patel.
When asked about the initiative taken by the committee in this regard, Gohil said it did not meet even once in the last two years. He said that he wrote
to the CM about it and also raised the issue in the budget session of the Assembly in July, but nothing was done.
According to MAGP, most of the RTI queries come from farmers. An analysis of the applications done by MAGP shows that farmers accounted for 16 per cent of the RTI queries specially about land issues, followed by teachers (11 per cent), small traders and businessmen (seven per cent), disabled persons(seven per cent) and daily wage workers (four per cent).
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