Times of India: Chennai: Monday,
April 14, 2014.
From
redirecting queries to giving vague replies, or just ignoring the envelopes
that land on their tables, officials in some government departments in the
state are gaining notoriety for delaying information under the Right to
Information Act.
While the RTI
Act was introduced to promote transparency in government departments, a section
of them are misusing specific clauses in the legislation to stave off
questions. A recent RTI filed by TOI is a case in point. The department of
personnel and administration reforms - the nodal agency for the RTI Act -
denied information on the grounds that it would affect its routine work.
The public
information officer (PIO) of the department cited Section 7(9) of the act,
which says "Information shall ordinarily be provided in the form in which
it is sought unless it would disproportionately divert the resources of the
public authority or would be detrimental to the safety or preservation of the
record in question."
Officials are
also coming up with ways to delay information in instances that clearly would
not require "disproportionate" diversion of resources. Metrowater,
the transport department and TNEB keep passing the buck through their warrens
of rooms, while departments like social defence, Tasmac and police are
reluctant to collate information and insist that applicants file separate RTIs
to different sub-departments. This is a violation of the act.
Seven of the
the 15 zones in Chennai corporation - Royapuram, Thiru Vi Ka Nagar, Ambattur,
Anna Nagar, Teynampet, Kodambakkam and Valasarvakkam - are regular defaulters
in furnishing information.
A PIO in the
corporation admitted they don't have a centralised system to gather information
from corporation zones. "Many PIOs are busy with other work and don't have
the time to furnish the information within the stipulated time," he said,
adding that the corporation also lacks a separate RTI cell to gather data from
various departments and zones.
The
department of social defence has also consistently violated Section 6 (3) of
the act, which mandates transfer of the information request to the concerned authority
if the application is not meant for the department. "If the information
relates to more than one public authority, the application need not be
transferred to all. It is informed that the petitioner may send individual
application to each of the public authorities concerned," an RTI reply
from the department to a query said.
For most
PIOs, staff shortage, lack of records and pressure from higher officials, are
favourite picks from their pool of excuses to delay and deny information under
the act. Activists have pinned the blame on the state information commission
for these delay tactics. "The main threat to the RTI Act is the state
information commission, which has failed to impose fines on PIOs," said M
Thuyamurthy, an RTI activist from Tondiarpet. "The PIOs are under no
pressure to answer queries. So these delay tactics come as no surprise,"
he said.
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