DNA: Mumbai: Saturday, October
01, 2016.
Leader of
opposition, Pravin Chheda and standing committee chairperson, Yashodhar
Shailesh Phanse in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), in their
respective letters to the Municipal Commissioner have asked him to look into
demand of their colleague which asks formation of rules to 'reign' in RTI
activist.
The
corporator who wrote to them is Javed Juneja, in the capacity of the president
of the committees of A, B and E wards. Juneja belongs to Congress party that
brought the Act. dna in its June 14 issue had reported that the Mayor too had
asked that RTI activists be reigned in for better mental health of officers.
Her letter to the information commission was also based on letter from Juneja.
dna filed RTI
applications to know details of harassment meted out to officials along with
remedial action the BMC had taken. BMC's general administration department said
that no such records existed apart from letters from corporators.
In his
letter, Juneja stated that there are different days designated for public
grievances and for hearing of RTI applications. "However, even on the days
meant for grievances, RTI activists are present among the citizens, sitting in
front of officials for hours together. For one complaint, they file 10 to 12
RTI applications after two days. So the officials lose a lot of time in
gathering this information," his letter read.
He stated
that the activists usually come from places like Thane and Kalyan. "When
the mental framework of officials is spoiled, the other official work they have
gets affected. Since they are busy giving replies to RTI activists, they don't
even take note of complaints made by corporators on the phone," the letter
added.
Referring to
the letter by Juneja, Chheda who is also from Congress stated that, in order to
give officials more time to work for the corporation, there should be some
restriction on the conduct of RTI activists.
Yashoshar
'Shailesh' Phanse, from Shiv Sena in his letter reiterated what Juneja had
said, that RTI activist from outside Mumbai ask information that leads to
troubled work attitude of officials. "RTI is a good Act. But there should
not be any misuse of it. I get thousands of letters and it is my duty to
forward every letter from my colleagues. I have only asked that the demand be
looked into. It does not mean I support his complaint," Phanse told dna.
Sudhir Naik,
deputy municipal commissioner in his response to all of them stated that the
RTI Act makes it mandatory to reply to applicants. Also, making rules is with
the government under section 27 of the RTI Act.
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