Milli Gazette: J&K: Raja
Muzaffar Bhat: Sunday, June 02, 2013.
The Right to
Information Act (RTI Act 2005) enacted by Government of India is not applicable
to Jammu & Kashmir in view of the special constitutional status of J&K
state provided under article 370 of the constitution of India . It is not the
case of only RTI Act which is not applicable to J&K state but all laws
passed by the Indian parliament cannot be extended to Jammu & Kashmir
unless the J&K legislature ratifies them. If one could have noticed it is clearly mentioned on
the Gazette Notification of any law enacted by the Parliament which reads “this
law will extend to whole of India except Jammu & Kashmir”.
Thus the RTI
Act 2005 could not be extended to J&K state but the state government had
already enacted a similar law in J&K state
known as J&K RTI Act 2004, a year before the act passed by the
Indian parliament October 2005. The RTI
Act 2005 is much better than the J&K RTI Act. Due to continuous pressure
from activist groups, a new RTI law known as J&K RTI Act 2009 was enacted
by the Omar Abdullah Government on 20 March, 2009. This new J&K RTI Act is
similar to the Indian RTI Act. The new J&K RTI Act completed its four years
last March.
RTI
Empowering Kashmiris;
The RTI Act
has empowered large numbers of people
not only in various parts of India but also in J&K. This is one of the
unique legislations where there is no role of lawyers and people are not
supposed to knock at the doors of the courts and do have to hire lawyers while
seeking information from the public authorities. If we analyse the J&K RTI
Act 2009, we can see many achievements. Some of them are as follows:
CM’s
Chopper:
Last year a
news regarding the misuse of the state chopper by Chief Minister Omar Abdullah
hit the headlines not only in J&K but across India. Various New Delhi-based
news channels and newspapers highlighted this issue. But what most of these
news channels or newspapers missed to mention is the role of a poor man living
under Below Poverty Line (BPL) who actually sought information from the Chief
Minister’s office under the RTI Act.
In this whole
story what strikes out is that an ordinary, illiterate, poor man - Aam Aadmi –
living in a remote hamlet of Drang Khag
of Kashmir questioned the Chief Minister’s conduct. The biggest achievement in
this whole scenario is seeing a poor man like Bashir Malik, the
information-seeker, empowered by using his right. This aspect was more
important than the whopping twelve crore expenditure on state chopper for the
last two and a half years by the Chief Minister.
I have known
Bashir for some time and I could feel his passion for fighting against
misgovernance, nepotism, and corruption. One and a half year back Bashir could
not even dare to enter the office of a Tehsildar or a Block Development Officer.
What empowered Bashir so much? The answer is the RTI Act. This young man along
with his friends has totally changed the style and functioning of Government
offices in his area. Today there is much transparency in the allotment of money
to homeless people under Indira Awas Yojna in Bashir’s Drang village. Officials
of Food Supplies or Revenue Department do not dare to ask for bribe for
providing BPL ration cards to people. MG NREGA is being implemented properly.
Still there are lots of problems and challenges ahead for this young band of
activists.
Sarpanch
pays back swindled money;
Fayaz Ahmad
Wani, an information-seeker, is an ordinary, semi-literate villager who used his democratic right under the RTI
Act and created a history by forcing the Sarpanch of his village to deposit
swindled money back into Government chest. Recently Fayaz was awarded for his
courage and valour by CNN IBN in New Delhi. Noted social activist and
anti-corruption fighter Anna Hazare and Editor
of CNN IBN, Rajdeep Sardesai,
honoured this poor villager before a large august gathering. Fayaz was
awarded Citizen Journalist award 2012 for his anti-corruption work using RTI as
a tool. Fayaz Ahmad Wani had turned
citizen journalist last year after the RTI exposé of Indira Awas Yojna scam in
Kutabal, Budgam and this forced the sarpanch Abdul Ahad Khan to pay back Rs
5.53 lakh into the Government account.
Nazir gets
scholarship for her daughter;
Nazir Ahmad
Deenda, who belongs to the Scheduled Tribe (ST) Muslim Gujjar community, sought
details of scholarships being provided to ST students of his village. The officials
of Education Department used to swindle the money but after filing the RTI
application in the Zonal Education Officer’s Office, the scholarship was
distributed amongst the rightful beneficiaries including the daughter of Nazir
in the remote village of Mujapathree.
If poor
people like Fayaz, Bashir and Nazir could expose the corrupt and question even
the Chief Minister of the state, why can’t Muslims living in various parts of
India do the same? I have personally observed that Muslims living in various
parts of India hardly know about the RTI. NGOs working for Muslim welfare
should take up the RTI awareness work in the community as a mission. The Union
Ministry of Minority Affairs must also play its role in creating RTI awareness
through various social groups, NGOs, media etc in every part of India so that
this deprived community may get justice with dignity which indeed is its
constitutional right.
A
resident from Kutabal village of Budgam
district won the CNN-IBN Citizen
Journalist award for the year 2012 for his fight against corruption. The
36-year-old Fayaz Ahmad Wani (above in picture), a semi-illiterate man from
small hamlet of Kutabal Chadoora in
central Kashmir’s Budgam district used RTI Act to expose a scam in Indira Awas
Yojna (IAY).
An amount of
Rs 5.53 lakh was recovered by the Government after RTI expose. The local media and CNN IBN had highlighted
this issue as Fayaz turned a citizen journalist (CJ) to expose the scam.
While
speaking at the function at Taj Palace hotel in New Delhi, Fayaz said it was
due to RTI that he was able to expose the corrupt. He said that he would
continue to fight for justice of poor people and will use RTI to expose the
corrupt. Fayaz wasn’t allowed to enter into the village for three months last summer
and his brother’s medical shop was also sealed by the local Sarpanch who had
issued a dikat against him and his family.
Noted social
activist Anna Hazare, CNN IBN Editor-in-Chief Rajdeep Sardesai gave away the
citizen journalist award to Fayaz Ahmad.
RTI activist
and founder of J&K RTI Movement Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat also accompanied
Fayaz at the function in New Delhi.
Fayaz said he
still receives threats from the criminal elements and appealed the civil
society to come to his rescue. Noted Social Activist Anna Hazare, CNN IBN
Editor in Chief gave away the citizen journalist award to Fayaz Ahmad.
The
author is an RTI activist based in Budgam, Kashmir.
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