Times of India: New Delhi: Sunday, March 11, 2018.
An analysis
of the functioning of state information commissions between January 2016 and
October 2017 shows an increasing pendency and a refusal to impose penalty on
laggard government departments. The study found that in some state information
commissions - like West Bengal - the wait for hearing on a fresh appeal would
be 43 years while in Kerala and Odisha, it would be more than six and five years
respectively.
More
alarmingly, the state information commissions (SICs) of West Bengal and Mizoram
did not impose any penalty for the period under review. The RTI Act empowers
the SICs to impose penalties of upto Rs 25,000 on erring PIOs for violations of
the Act. “The penalty clause is one of the key provisions in terms of giving
the law its teeth and acting as a deterrent for PIOs against violating the
law,” pointed out Anjali Bhardwaj of the Satark Nagrik Sangathan, which carried
out the study in association with the Center for Equity Studies (CES).
One of the
reasons for the massive wait period in the West Bengal SIC is the slow disposal
of cases, enabled by a commission that is not fully staffed. According to
Bhardwaj, the SIC of West Bengal is currently functioning with just two
commissioners. During the time period under review (January 1, 2016 to October
31, 2017), for a period of nearly 10 months, there was only one commissioner in
the SIC.
Similarly,
the SIC of Kerala is functioning with a single commissioner. As of October 31,
2017 nearly 14,000 appeals and complaints were pending with the commission.
Odisha SIC is functioning with 3 commissioners despite having a pendency of
more than 10,000 appeals and complaints as of October 31, 2017, says the study.
Added Bhardwaj, “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.”
The report is
primarily based on an analysis of information accessed under the RTI Act, from
29 information commissions across India. A total of 169 RTI applications were
filed with state information commissions and the Central Information Commission
(CIC). Jammu & Kashmir was excluded as the national RTI law is not
applicable in the state.
As per the
record from the RTIs, UP registered the highest number of appeals and
complaints (83,054) followed by the CIC (47,756) and Karnataka (32,403).
Mizoram and Meghalaya registered the lowest number of appeals and complaints,
21 and 63 respectively. In terms of disposal, the CIC disposed the highest
number of appeals and complaints (54,219), followed by UP (42,911) and
Karnataka (28,648).
In terms of
quantum of penalty imposed, Karnataka was the leader (Rs 1.69 crore), followed
by Haryana (Rs 95.97 lakh), and Uttarakhand (Rs 72 lakh). CIC imposed penalty
amounting to Rs 29.36 lakh in the time frame of the study.
The SICs of
Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu &
Uttar Pradesh did not provide information on penalties imposed and recovered.
Analysis of
the figures for 20 ICs (which provided information on both the number of cases
disposed and the number of cases where penalty was imposed) shows that penalty
was imposed in just 2.4 percent of the cases disposed.
.JPG)
.JPG)
