Deccan
Herald: Mysore: Thursday, 12 February 2015.
Of the 33
government departments in the State, only six departments in the top order have
been petitioned with majority queries under the Right to Information (RTI) Act,
according to the statistics available with the State Information Commission.
Addressing
the media here on Tuesday, State Information Commissioner Dr Shekar D Sajjannar
said that of the total 4,25,475 applications received under Right to
Information Act in 2013-2014, 96.84 per
cent of the applications have been disposed. Departments like Revenue, Urban
Development, Rural Development and Panchayat Raj, Transport, Education and Home,
account for 77.64 per cent of the total applications. Interestingly, the first
three departments in the order constitute 65.23 per cent of applications
received by the Commission. The remaining 23 per cent of the applications
pertain to 27 departments.
Giving the
split figures, the Commissioner said that Revenue department received 1,46,715
applications, while 1,32,353 applications were disposed; followed by Urban
Development - 89,026 received and 83,550 disposed; RDPR - 74,001 and 70,839;
Transport - 22,718 and 21,773; Education
- 21,139 and 20,755; and Home - 12,049 and 12,027.
However, the
Commissioner said, 3.16 per cent of the total applicants have approached the
commission comprising 2,970 complaints and 10,490 in the form of appeals.
Stating that
the Act was on the verge of completing one decade in existence on October 12,
Sajjannar said that as many as 62,602 public authorities (offices holding the
information) were functioning in the State, followed by 80,000 Public
Information Officers (PIOs).
Sajjannar
said, during the previous fiscal, the Commission levied penalty of Rs 1.34
crore on the PIOs, with Rs 12.12 lakh among the same awarded as compensation to
the applicants. The maximum penalty of Rs 39 lakh has been imposed on RDPR
department, followed by Rs 36 lakh on UDD, and Rs 29 lakh on the Revenue
department.
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