‘Keep files open to public once a month’

Times of India: Panaji: Sunday, 12 October 2014.

Transparency in keeping files open to public scrutiny, suo motu disclosures of information by public authorities and updating of government websites regularly can avert the need for citizens to file applications under Right to Information (RTI) Act.

This was the conclusion at a one-day workshop on RTI organized by Goa RTI Forum, in association with Goa state central library, for mainly lecturers from commerce colleges, at central library lecture hall, Panaji, recently. It was held as a precursor to the proposed implementation of RTI module in the second year B Com syllabus of Goa University, a first of its kind initiative in the country.

The speakers stated that each public authority must suo motu disclose information as per provisions of Section 4 of the RTI Act. Updating government department websites would help citizens to log on and obtain requisite information, but mostly the websites have not been updated for a long time. "This way the time of public information officer (PIO) and the citizens would not be wasted," a speaker said.

The resource team comprising Aires Rodrigues, Kashinath Shetye, Ketan Govekar, Pundalik Raiker, Sandeep Heble, M Shanti, Augusto Pinto, Sangeeta Naik and Ganpat Kurtikar introduced the participants to the nuances of RTI Act 2005.

While demanding that the vacant posts of state information commissioner (SIC) and the Lokayukta be filled up immediately, the forum pointed out that the orders passed by the SIC without a bench are being set aside.

A speaker said the government offices could also keep their files open to students and the public for one day every month, as is being done in some other places, as this would reduce the necessity of filing RTI applications.

The charge that the RTI Act was being misused by the citizenry was denied. The misuse could be nominal and filing of most applications was necessitated as information is not put in public domain as a matter of routine.

It was recommended at the workshop that the public authorities should not misinterpret provisions of RTI Act and ask citizens to cite reasons or file an affidavit about their citizenship to seek information.