Navhind
Times: Gujarat: Friday, 05 February 2016.
ROMEL
Sutharia, a Right to Information (RTI) activist was allegedly attacked on
Wednesday by a group of unidentified persons outside the Collector office in
Tapi district of Gujarat for allegedly seeking information and opposing
‘illegal mining’. Sutharia was assaulted
by over a dozen persons, who also snatched his file bearing documents he had
obtained through the RTI when he was on his way to the Collector office for a
hearing on his complaint to the Governor. Sutharia used RTI to work toward
revoking of the licences given to the majority of 62 sand and stone quarries by
the District Mines and Mineral Department because he claimed they were issued
in contravention of environmental guidelines laid down by the government. On
November 23, 2015 Sutharia wrote to the Governor on the large-scale illegal
mining of sand and stone over the Tapi river and across the district. The
Collector called him for hearing on Wednesday to attend which he was going when
he was attacked.
Sutharia is
one of the many RTI activists who have been attacked, several of them losing
their lives, since the Right to Information Act was passed in 2005 empowering
ordinary citizens to seek information on issues and subjects in which they
suspected wrongdoings, favouritism, illegality and foul play. And as in most
cases, the local police have not taken deterrent action, because first, they
take the cases in a routine manner and secondly, they come under the pressure
of government officials and the unscrupulous forces that are engaged in
illegalities. In Sutharia case, Tapi police have registered an FIR against
“unidentified persons” and say they are trying to obtain footage of CCTV cameras
installed in the district collectorate building to ascertain their identity.
The number of RTI activists assaulted in Gujarat is very large, and most cases
have not resulted in punishment to the vested interests that were exposed by
the victims. The state government does not have any sympathy with them. The
Gujarat State Information Commission pays such scant regard to RTI that it has
never published an annual report on its website since the RTI Act was passed.
However, it
is not only in Gujarat. The highest number of attacks on RTI activists is
reported from Maharashtra where the number of RTI applications is also the
highest. Not long ago, Shiv Sena workers
assaulted and blackened the face of an RTI activist Mallikarjun
Bhaikatti at Latur in Maharashtra’s Marathwada region, after he exposed an
illegal construction case. Bhaikatti had, through an RTI query, revealed that
around 14,000 square feet illegal construction was carried out in a
four-storeyed building and boys’ hostel on Latur-Nanded road. Bhaikatti
addressed a press conference at Latur to “expose” the illegal construction the
day before the Sena workers assaulted him with an iron rod, before blackening
his face, dubbing him as a “blackmailer”. The panchas of a panchayat in Raigad
district in Maharashtra allegedly threatened an RTI activist Laxman Thakur
after he filed an RTI application seeking information regarding encroachments
of forest land. A pancha allegedly picked up a brick and threatened to smash
Thakur’s head, and the panchayat threatened to ostracize his family.
The RTI Act
was passed after decades of public struggle to promote transparency and
accountability in the working of every public authority. Promotion of people’s
access to information must be seen as integral to India’s growth story. Greater
transparency by public institutions can effectively frustrate the motives of
those who are trying to hide the information that people fighting corruption
are seeking. The government agencies must consider RTI as an important tool for
curtailing theft of public funds and ensuring accountability for abuses.
Instead, the experience of RTI activists is that public officials try to
frustrate and discourage them as much as possible by delaying answers or
providing vague and inadequate answers or denying the information on specious
grounds. Information commissions are also understaffed and under-resourced to
be unable to provide complete and satisfactory responses to RTI queries.
RTI activists
are extremely vulnerable as they do not belong to any organization or large
group but often work alone inspired by the zeal for public probity. These
individuals run very high risks as their queries arouse hostility and anger
among powerful politicians, bureaucrats, unscrupulous businessmen and policemen.
In their desperation to profit from their wrongdoings and corruption, these
groups form a strong nexus and often devise ways to harm the RTI activists
physically. The government and the police have not proven themselves to be
helpful to RTI activists. They have not pursued the killers and attackers of
RTI activists vigorously and zealously. Unless the government acts proactively
on the side of RTI activists, the purpose of the law can never be fully
achieved.
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