Web India: New Delhi: Sunday,
March 11, 2018.
The Central Information Commission (CIC)
reportedly provided misleading information about the number of appeals and
complaints pending before it on its website, say the findings of a report card
on the performance of Information Commissions in India.
The assessment was carried out by Satark Nagrik
Sangathan (SNS) and Centre for Equity Studies (CES).
"In response to an application filed under
the RTI Act, the CIC stated that as of December 31, 2016, the total number of
appeals and complaints pending with it were 28,502. However, the CIC website
shows that only 364 cases were pending with the commission as on January 1,
2017," said the study.
"It is inexplicable how overnight the
pendency figure reduced from 28,502 to 364."
To the query on the number of pending cases as of
October 31, 2017, the CIC, in its initial reply, said 21,097 appeals and 3,533
complaints were pending.
"However, in a subsequent reply, the CIC
stated that 20,484 appeals and 3,460 complaints were pending as of October 31,
2017. No explanation was given for providing a different set of pendency
figures for the same time period," it said.
According to the report card, the number of
appeals and complaints pending on December 31, 2016 in the 23 information commissions
stood at 1,81,852. The pendency increased to 1,99,186 at the end of October
2017.
"As of October 31, 2017, the maximum number
of appeals/complaints were pending in Uttar Pradesh (41,561) followed by
Maharashtra (41,178) and Karnataka (32,992). The CIC with 23,944 pending
appeals and complaints came in at number four. There were no backlogs in the
SICs of Mizoram and Sikkim as of October 31, 2017," it added.
The huge backlog in the disposal of appeals and
complaints by the commissions is one of the most serious problems being faced
by the transparency regime in India, it said.
The high levels of pendency are often a result of
non-appointment of commissioners in the IC and/or the tardy functioning of
existing commissioners, the report card said, adding that it result in
applicants having to wait for many months, even years, for their appeals and
complaints to be heard.
The analysis of the IC websites revealed that many
of the commissions had not posted their annual reports on the website of the respective
Information Commissions, it said.
"As the information was sought from the
commissions in November 2017, it would be reasonable to expect that annual
reports up to 2016 would be available. Yet 18 out of 29 ICs (62 per cent) had
not published their annual report for 2016 on their website.
"Punjab SIC has not published its annual
report after 2012, while Jharkhand, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have not
published annual reports after 2013. While Uttar Pradesh IC stated in response
to an RTI application that the annual report for 2016-17 had been published,
the same was not available on its website," it added.
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