Times of India: Mumbai: Thursday, 08 May 2014.
Glojer
D'Souza, a feisty citizen, has effectively battled government apathy by using a
combination of two laws the Right to Information Act and a little-known
Maharashtra state Act, which holds civil servants accountable for delay in
clearing files. His efforts have earned him Rs 10,000 compensation from the BMC
for shoddy and vague replies to his RTI queries. Maharashtra's State
Information Commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad passed an order earlier this week
calling for compensation in the matter.
"Both
Acts complement each other and when implemented together, result in government
officials being held accountable for delay in generating information,"
says Gaikwad.
Six months
ago, TOI had reported how D'Souza used RTI to restore his mother's pension. A
school teacher for 20 years, Gloria D'Souza was denied pension when she
retired.
D'Souza has
now been fighting to ensure his mother gets pension under the Sixth Pay
Commission. He has also sought information on other teachers with pending
cases.
D'Souza
stumbled upon a proposal to provide teachers with pension under the Sixth Pay
Commission scales that has received state government approval but has been
lying with the BMC since 2010.
He then made use of the Government Servants
Regulation of Transfers and Prevention of Delay in Discharge of Official Duties
Act, popularly known as the Right to Services Act, which states that no file
shall remain pending with any government servant for more than seven working
days. It adds for files that need to be transferred to other departments,
action must be taken within three months.
Glojer filed
RTI queries seeking answers to what action was being taken against officials
with whom the proposal on pensions was pending for nearly four years. He
received a series of garbled answers to his RTI queries. This led him to file
an appeal with the information commission.
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