Times of India: Meerut: Saturday,
April 30, 2016.
The Uttar
Pradesh state information commissioner (SIC) Rajkeshwar Singh has said giving
"misleading or incomplete information" under the Right to Information
(RTI) Act was like "not giving information at all."
Singh chaired a meeting of information officers
from Gautam Budh Nagar district here on Friday.
"It is
your (officials) duty to give complete information to people. Giving
misleading, less or incomplete information under the RTI Act falls under the
same category as not giving information at all. The Right to Information is a
Fundamental Right and India's RTI Act is the best in the world. That is because
our RTI Act also includes information on the progress made on work that is
under construction. This makes it distinct from the law in 97 other countries,"
Singh said.
The SIC
further added, "Under India's RTI Act, any applicant has the right to ask
any public authority to produce a document, ask to examine a document and even
ask for certified samples of material being used in construction work."
Talking to
reporters in Meerut earlier this week, Uttar Pradesh chief information officer
(CIO) Javed Usmani had stated that there were over 48,000 pending RTI queries
in the state. More than 5,000 queries have been cleared since Usmani took
office as the state's CIO in February 2015. The state government has started a
training programme for 18,000 public information officers (PIOs) across the
state. The training is being conducted at the divisional-level. The training
programme in Lucknow had concluded earlier this month. Meerut is the second
administrative division where the training is being carried out.
.JPG)
.JPG)
