RTI Movement conducts workshop on RTI Act in Ganderbal

Rising Kashmir‎: Srinagar: Tuesday, April 26, 2016.

Continuing with conducting series of workshops with different districts PIOs on proactive disclosure (Sec.-4) of RTI Act-2009, J&K RTI Movement and Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative has conducted second workshop with district administration Ganderbal.

PIOs, APIOs and FAAs from district Ganderbal participated in this day long workshop.

Junaid-ul-Haq Andrabi, Convenor J&K RTI Movement in his introductory address introduced JKRTIM to all the PIOs and also explained the history of having the Right to Information Act in Jammu and Kashmir.

He said that having the right to ask for information from government offices is a fundamental and absolute right of every citizen irrespective of age, colour, creed, race or religion.

Shaikh Ghulam Rasool, Chairperson, J&K RTI Movement and Co-convenor NCPRI, familiarized the PIOs with procedures by which citizens can access information under the J&K RTI Act from public authority.

Shaikh said, “Section 23 of the Act mandates the J&K Government to organise public education programmes, including the training of PIOs on RTI Law.”

“Thus this emerged as a deliberate venture of Government and J&K RTI Movement to help out PIOs by equipping them with training and procedures to let the information be disbursed on time and in an effective manner,” he said while responding to several queries raised by PIOs with regard to the issues they come across while receiving the request for divulging  information.

Advocate Syed Mujtaba Hussain, Coordinator, J&K RTI Movement addressed the PIOs what are the dos and don’ts they need to observe while receiving application for information.

He also talked about what information could be sought from PIOs and what are the obligations of public authorities.

Syed highlighted the two important sections of RTI Act-2009, that every PIOs needs to know, Sec-4 (Proactive disclosure) and Sec-8 (Exemption from disclosure of information).

If section 4 is implemented properly, the number of RTI applications will reduce to 80%, he said.

PIOs of the district administration highlighted the fact that it is mandatory for public authorities to know the RTI Act and various efforts should be made by Government to equip public authority with training and procedures in effective delivery of RTI Law.

The other participants who represented J&K RTI Movement included Shakeel-ur-Rasool and Advocate Bilal Ahmed.