New Delhi, Nov 18 (PTI)
In the first order of its kind, the Central Information Commission has directed all public authorities to appoint within 30 days senior officials as Transparency Officers, who would act as an interface between the Commission, people and public authorities.
The Transparency Officers shall be "very senior" officials other than Public Information Officers and Appellate Authorities which are designated for replying RTI applications and listening to appeals against the replies respectively.
"They will be very senior officials of the department who will act as an interface between the Commission and the public authorities on the one hand and the public authority and the people on the other," Chief Information Commissioner A N Tiwari told PTI.
The order was signed by Chief Information Commissioner A N Tiwari and all six Information Commissioners. In the order the panel has directed all public authorities to index and catalogue their entire records within six months as mandatory under proactive disclosure clause of the RTI Act.
The transparency panel has instructed all the Secretaries of the Government of India to ensure compliance of the directions by all the public authorities within their jurisdiction.
It has also directed to ensure that the entire records are digitised and placed on a computer network for easy dissemination of information among the public but no time limit has been prescribed for it.
As a short term objective, all the public authorities will place information about their working within 120 days.
The transparency panel and public can keep a sharp eye on the implementation of these directive through a web portal developed by the CIC where the all the compliance reports will be put by the public authorities.
The instructions are aimed at easy facilitation of information to citizens without going through the RTI channel which at times is time taking. The section four of the RTI Act mandates authorities to make public information about their working in public domain within 120 days of the transparency law came into force in 2005.
They have also been obligated to index, catalogue and digitise and place their records on computer network under the law but so far the progress has been "tardy", the Commission said in its order.
"It is time that these directives of the law are fully implemented in a systematic manner through time bound action," it said.
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