Daily Excelsior: J&K: Wednesday,
October 26, 2016.
Right to
Information (RTI) Act was a landmark legislation that contributed to the
democratic dispensation of our country and the State as it meant devolution of
right to the ordinary citizens of India. The significance of this right lies in
the fact that Governments are usually reticent in providing any information to
the people who seek it. When a minister is inducted into office after taking
oath of secrecy, he is under the impression that all that he sees, hears or
says is of highest secrecy and should never be shared with a third person. This
impression remains embedded in the mind. However, a distinction has to be made
between what is to be divulged and what is to be kept back. It is true that the
Government has to be secretive in some matters, especially those pertaining to
security and sensitivity of the state. It is for the functionary, a bureaucrat
or a minister to make clear in his mind the distinction between what can be
disclosed and what cannot be disclosed.
By and large, people are not really interested
in scratching secrets from the Government. They are essentially interested in
knowing the status of their personal/collateral/social cases that have a
bearing on their future and the future of society. We, therefore, expect that
Government will not try to take shelter behind the oath of secrecy plank but on
merits of the case.
Right to information is not to be seen necessarily
from the standpoint of pillorying the Government. Its important manifestation
is that of strengthening the democratic system and infusing confidence in a
voter that he is empowered to seek information that would convince him he is on
the right track. In the follow up action to the Act, the State constituted the
State Information Commission with Chief Information Commissioner assisted by
two Information Commissioners. Looking in retrospect, one may say that the
Commission had somewhat unsmooth beginning and had to overcome a number of
initial hiccups before it would find itself in real functioning position. These
odds included logistics as well for which it had to almost beg the Government.
An impression, right or wrong, was created that the Government was not really
and out of heart cooperating with the Commission or to put it in crude words
was not happy that it should become something of a policeman overlooking the
working and the decisions of the Government. In pragmatic terms, the Commission
never aspired to be either a policeman or a watchdog over the administration.
Nevertheless, it had to mind the business of ensuring that parties seeking
information on a variety of cases were not disappointed or that the Government
did not conceal information from the general public if it was in the interests
of the people. Maybe at times some complaints were brought to the Commission by
aggrieved parties. Obviously the Commission is enjoined by constitution to
respond to these grievances if these are against the administration. It has to
seek the report of the administration and thus carry on the process under
rules. Nobody, especially no administrative branch should be offended if the
Commission seeks information in a particular case.
An impression has been created that the
Government is not interested in the Commission conducting its duties and
functions. This is a crude way of saying that the Government is against its own
organ. On the face of it, there appears little sense in this kind of
impression. But the ground situation creates doubts and thee have to be
removed. One Information Commissioner retired a year ago and the post remains
vacant ever since. Why should it remain vacant is the question. Why is not the
Government serious about make the Commission rightly functional? Leaving the
post vacant for a long time obviously means that the Government is not
interested in the organization. Then the Chief Information Commissioner Sofi
retired in February last. His post also remains vacant till date. The GAD has
not so far drawn a panel of names to be considered for appointment of CIC. What
does this mean? Does it not reinforce the impression that the administration is
not really interested in making the Commission functional? What can a headless
organization do to mitigate the grievances of the people or the parties? The
administration is happy that it has got rid of headache called State
Information Commission.
The third jolt to the Commission is now in the
offing and when that happens, the Commission will die natural death or that it
will be put in the cold store. The lone Information Commissioner is about to
retire in a month or so. After his retirement, the doors of the Commission will
be locked and the only body that will be happy will be the administration
because now nobody will be there to ask them to respond to the query of people
looking for right to information.
We fail to understand why the administration
has been meting out scurvy treatment to this important organization? The
Commission is put under the temporary charge of an incumbent which in itself is
a reflection. It means that the Government does not attach due importance to
the post and therefore has allowed someone to hold its temporary charge.
Government’s stubbornness in not providing necessary wherewithal to the
Commission is to be found in the Government trivializing the directive of the
High Court which has impressed upon the Government to fill the vacant posts of
CIC and IC and make the organization functional. As per the provisions of
J&K Right to Information Act, the Chief Information Commissioner and
Information Commissioner shall be appointed by the Governor on the
recommendations of a committee consisting of Chief Minister, who shall be
Chairperson of the committee, Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Assembly
and a Cabinet Minister to be nominated by the Chief Minister as its Members.
This exercise has not been made so far and there is no indication when the
Government will move in this direction. In such a situation transparency
becomes the casualty.
It is a matter of disappointment to the
citizens that an organization that was supposed to protect and enforce their
rights has been paralyzed through the cleverness of administration. There is
somebody somewhere in the entire scenario that is behind the process
obstructing it. We implore the Government to take this matter as serious
violation of the rights of the citizens. The court order has to be implemented
and the State Information Commission has to be med fully and forcefully
functional.
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