FAHEEM ASLAM; SRINAGAR, TUESDAY, 12 OCTOBER 2010
While the Right to Information Act (RTI) is completing five years of its implementation on October 12 (Tuesday), it is yet to take-off in Jammu and Kashmir, negating the state government’s recurring assurance that it would strengthen the Act to “bring transparency in the system.”
While the Act came into force on October 12, 2005 in rest of the country, it has been applicable to Jammu and Kashmir since 20 March 2009 under the title “J&K Right to Information Act, 2009.”
But so far, the Act has proved to be a damp squib in the state, primarily in absence of the full-fledged State Information Commission (SIC), which the government is unable to constitute for unknown reasons.
A cursory look at the ‘status’ of the RTI Act in Jammu and Kashmir reveals a sordid tale of official apathy toward the Act and those who intend to seek information under it.
When the state government passed the Act and made its rules in June 2009, it promised to appoint the Chief Information Commission and two Information Commissioners within three months. But over a year after, “politics” has marred the appointments.
Reports have already started pouring in that the state government intends to appoint a retired bureaucrat as the state’s Chief Information Commissioner. And this, according to observers, would be nothing but an ‘insult’ to the RTI Act. “Why can’t a journalist or a teacher be the CIC?” asked Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat, who heads an organization named “J&K RTI Movement.” “In other states there are journalists and teachers who head the Commission. God knows why the state is considering only retired bureaucrats fit for the job, even as it may affect the transparency of the entire Act.”
Almost two years down the line, figures reveal that 500 plus applications under RTI are craving for a hearing before the SIC. “But when there is no CIC, whom would the information-seekers approach? We strongly condemn the inordinate delay in appointment of the CIC. We believe that the post should be immediately advertised so that persons of eminence and calibre are able to apply for it. That would certainly make the Act more strong and transparent.”
According to sources, the state has so far failed to hold any rigorous campaign with regard to promotion of the RTI Act among the civil servants and people at the grassroots level. “If they can hold awareness programmes about AIDS or consumer rights, why not the RTI Act which will help bring transparency in the otherwise corrupt system,” they asked. “This time hardly 10 percent civil servants know the Act and its use, others are just in slumber because of the government inaction vis-à-vis RTI campaigning.”
Highly placed administrative sources, privy to RTI deliberations, asserted that scores of applications seeking information under RTI were pending in different government departments, including the Directorate of Health Services, Home, Rural Development and Social Welfare Department etc. “Some of the applications are pending for the past one year and even more,” they said.
While there are fewer Public Information Officers at the district, tehsil or block levels, those in the higher officers are allegedly delaying providing information under the Act. Some of the information seekers are even threatened of dire-consequences if they didn’t withdraw their applications.
If the state government has anything to its credit vis-à-vis RTI, it is the alleged beating of a group of RTI activists who had sought some information under the Act in the Charar-e-Sharief constituency, represented by the Finance Minister, Abdur Rahim Rather.
Authorities at the National Institute of Technology literally vandalized the Right to Information Act by denying ‘factual information’ to its academics earlier this year. The aggrieved approached the Chief Information Commissioner, Government of India, Wajahat Habibullah, for ‘justice.’
In a letter to Wajahat the Teachers’ Society demanded an “impartial inquiry’ into the denial of information to a senior NIT professor under the RTI Act, asserting that the authorities harassed the applicant and denied him the medical reimbursement after he sought the “seniority list of professors”.
The RTI activists accuse the state government of fearing to appoint the SIC. “It is a very transparent law. Perhaps the state fears that it might have to face the music if put in dock by any information-seeker. Otherwise they have no reason whatsoever to appoint the SIC,” said Dr Bhat.
Pertinently, the Central Right to Information Act, 2005, applies to all the States and Union Territories of India, except the State Government of Jammu & Kashmir [J&K]. Nonetheless, the CRTI Act 2005 applies to Union Government offices within J&K. But the J&K Right to Information Act, 2009 applies to the Government of Jammu & Kashmir and all of its subsidiaries since 20 March 2009. The enactment of the JKRTI Act 2009 follows several years of activism by citizens groups to repeal the erstwhile J&K RTI Act 2004 & the J&K RTI Amendment Act 2008.
The Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI) will complete its five years on Tuesday. The RTI Act was enacted by the Parliament to set the practical regime of right to information for citizens.
The law was passed by Parliament on June15, 2005 and came into force on October 12, 2005.
With the help of the Right to Information Act, any citizen can request for information from a public authority, which is required to be replied within thirty days.
According to the Act, every public authority has to computerise their records for wide dissemination of information.
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