MC officers attend training programme on RTI Act

The Tribune: Ludhiana: Tuesday, December 19, 2017.

The Mahatma Gandhi State Institute of Public Administration (MGSIPA), Punjab, organised a two-day training programme for senior officers, including public information officers (PIOs) and assistant public information officers (APIOs) of the Ludhiana Municipal Corporation (MC) under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, here today.

About 60 participants are taking part in the training programme, which has been sponsored by the Ministry of Personnel and Training (DoPT). It aims at sensitising the officers concerned to the Act and also to make them aware of the latest developments based on the judgements of the Central/State Information Commissions.

Jaskiran Singh, IAS, Commissioner, Ludhiana MC, while launching the event at the meeting hall of the Ludhiana Municipal Corporation, said the RTI Act was a significant pro-people instrument aiming to bring about transparency and accountability in the administration, besides containing the tendency of corrupt practices. He said this was also an important tool for the empowerment of common man. He encouraged the officers to update their knowledge about this Act on the basis of knowledge imparted by the RTI experts in this two-day programme. He also asked the officers to give practical shape to the spirit of the Act and provide information available in official records and adhere to the time schedule provided in the Act.

Jarnail Singh, Course Director (RTI), MGSIPA, Chandigarh–cum-Regional Project Director, MGSIPA Regional Centre, Patiala, while highlighting the importance of such training programmes, said the institute organised over 200 programmes in a year on various subject such as RTI, Sevottam, office procedure, civil service rules, financial management, soft skills etc, besides providing consultancy, publications and dissemination of ideas/information in an integrated manner.

Eminent RTI expert DC Gupta, IDAS (retd) highlighted overall view of the RTI Act, suo-moto disclosure of information by the public authority and appointment of PIOs, APIOs, first appellate authority by the public authority, request for obtaining information and disposal of request.