Economic
Times: New Delhi: Monday, 06 April 2015.
The RTI
machinery all over India seems to be crumbling. Half the state information commissions,
the final appellate authorities for handling cases under the Right to
Information Act in states, are subsisting two or fewer commissioners as state
governments refuse to fill vacant positions.
Goa has an
ignominious distinction: it doesn't have a single information commissioner at
present. The cases that the commissions need to handle are piling up as 14 of
28 states (Andhra and Telangana share a commission) have two or fewer
commissioners. As per the RTI Act, each commission needs to be headed by a
chief information commissioner and can have up to 10 information commissioners.
UP is the only state which has filled up the full quota, show data compiled by
ET. Haryana has nine commissioners and the chief. Punjab and Andhra have eight
commissioners besides the chief information commissioner.
State
commissions in Goa and Assam are almost non-functional. In Goa, the commission
has been empty since Leela Mehendale retired as chief information commissioner
almost two months back. Assam got its chief information commissioner on
December 1, 2014 after a year, but the commission's work has been at a
standstill. The website has not been updated for almost a year. When ET
contacted Mohan Chandra Malakar, who retired as state information commissioner
in February 2014, he said: "The work has to be started. The new chief HS
Das has taken over and he is trying to get the staff and the commission back in
order. The website has not been updated and still shows me as the only
commissioner. This will take some time." Other states which are
functioning with just one commissioner include Jharkhand, Odisha, Meghalaya and
Sikkim.
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