Indian Express: Bangalore: Sunday, 19 May 2024.
If social media activism by any measure is considered to be a strong tool to expose misgovernance in the contemporary sense, 80-year-old Ravindranath Guru would have lacked some skills. However, as a scientist-turned-RTI activist in Bengaluru, his style of activism was constitutionally bound, data driven and hinged on accountability.
A former convenor of
Karnataka Right to Information Act Forum, a civic space founded by like-minded
social activists who fought against corruption, Guru exposed the
irregularities, misgovernance and corruption in Karnataka government agencies
through RTI.
Before dedicating 20 years of his post retirement life to RTI activism, Guru worked in the Department of Information Technology (earlier known as Department of Electronics) in Karnataka as a scientific officer. He was also instrumental in setting up a software tech park in Bengaluru’s Electronic city in 1991. However, after he retired in 2004, there was one thing lurking in his mind: ‘what about society?’
If you ask Guru what kept him going for 20 years as an individual popularizing RTI and exposing the government through RTIs, his simple answer would be ‘corruption’. Since 2004, he has filed more than 1100 RTIs across various departments and has uncovered unauthorized buildings approved by the government, mismanagement of public toilets, mismanagement of MP/MLA funds, irregularities in allotting houses to the urban poor, corruption in the solid waste management department of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), among others.
“After retirement, I realised that I was receiving a good amount of pension and my children were settling. But what bothered me was society and corruption; which is when I decided to give it back to society in my own way of RTI activism. My goal was simple: to help RTI reach every common man and deliver justice,” said Guru.
Before forming a ‘coalition against corruption’ in the form of KRIA forum in 2004, Guru was associated with Consumer Care Society that was instrumental in creating awareness on Consumer Acts. He was also associated with the Public Affairs Centre that focused on children’s movement for civic awareness and Bala Janagraha movement that focused on creating awareness among the public and children to become active citizens.
Just like the saying ‘charity begins at home’, Guru’s first fight against misgovernance began in his own neighborhood in Banashankari in Bengaluru in 2004. Through RTI documents, he exposed the unauthorised buildings sprouting in his neighborhood.
The growing number of commercial buildings, including convention centers, were on the rise, which prompted Guru to seek RTI response on the establishment of such buildings. “RTI documents revealed that these buildings initially granted for residential purposes were being used for commercial purposes. In fact, the corporator of one of the wards also purchased a building to construct a marriage hall, violating all the by-laws,” said Guru. However, what followed was an attack on his house allegedly by the corporator’s men. Guru later filed a complaint with the then chief secretary of Karnataka on the attack, after which he got protection from the Bengaluru police department.
Later, Guru weaponized RTI as a medium to help deliver justice to the common man. As the KRIA forum got popularized, the group was bombarded with tons of complaints and grievances from the public.
One such impactful revelation by KRIA forum was exposing the housing department of Karnataka’s financial and allotment irregularities in the Ragigudda Slum Board project under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission. A housing project consisting of 1,500 houses with each housing costing Rs 2 lakh (wherein Rs 1.8 lakh was provided a subsidy by the state government while the rest needs to be contributed by beneficiaries), was marred by corruption.
Guru’s RTI response showed that the local leaders had allotted over 400 houses to a certain set of people as per their ‘whims and fancies’ which was in gross violation of building by-laws.
Further, Guru also alleged that the share of the amount given by the beneficiaries was not accounted for and the housing department instead gave written receipts as against the Demand Draft issued by the slum dwellers. “There was gross misappropriation of funds by the account officials of the housing department. As a result of our RTI expose, the government issued an order directing the housing department to form a selection committee for appropriate and effective allotment of housing to the urban poor,” said Guru.
Further, Guru also brought to light the building by-laws violation by multiple convention centers across Bengaluru. Guru alleged that many owners of convention centers used the basement for dining and kitchen purposes rather than for parking, in violation of building by-laws. His RTI documents revealed that 110 out of 170 convention centers were using the basement for purposes other than parking.
The RTI chief information commissioner directed BBMP to frame Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) on acting against such violations as and when complaints were reported. In the Solid Waste Management department of BBMP, the garbage trucks travel at least 15 km outside the city to dump waste. But the contractors complained of resistance from villagers who were against dumping waste near their villages. Later, a clause was included in the contract that enabled BBMP to pay extra for the contractors for dumping garbage outside the city.
However, Guru filed an RTI which revealed that the contractors had over invoiced the BBMP that was approved and certified by the BBMP medical officers. An excess of Rs 8 crore of public money was spent, revealed Guru’s RTI documents.
“If the garbage truck traveled 15 km, the contractors invoiced it for 80 km. This is corruption to a big extent and misutilization of public money. After the RTI expose, the Bangalore Metropolitan Task Force under the BBMP ordered the recovery of the excess payment from the contractors. Unfortunately, no action was taken against the corrupt officials who approved the payment,” Guru mentioned.
Despite being an active RTI activist for 20 years, Guru believes that with integrity of many information commissioners in question and the information commission department only becoming opaque, it will discourage a lot of citizens, especially youngsters, from taking up RTI activism.
“Earlier the information commission officers had the integrity and directed the respective departments to take action against officials if found guilty. But now, the officers themselves are corrupt and are withholding crucial information. This only discourages active citizens, especially youngsters from filing an RTI and such a trend is only causing a blot on the institution,” said Guru, who quit KRIA forum in 2020 after meeting with a major accident.
If social media activism by any measure is considered to be a strong tool to expose misgovernance in the contemporary sense, 80-year-old Ravindranath Guru would have lacked some skills. However, as a scientist-turned-RTI activist in Bengaluru, his style of activism was constitutionally bound, data driven and hinged on accountability.
Before dedicating 20 years of his post retirement life to RTI activism, Guru worked in the Department of Information Technology (earlier known as Department of Electronics) in Karnataka as a scientific officer. He was also instrumental in setting up a software tech park in Bengaluru’s Electronic city in 1991. However, after he retired in 2004, there was one thing lurking in his mind: ‘what about society?’
If you ask Guru what kept him going for 20 years as an individual popularizing RTI and exposing the government through RTIs, his simple answer would be ‘corruption’. Since 2004, he has filed more than 1100 RTIs across various departments and has uncovered unauthorized buildings approved by the government, mismanagement of public toilets, mismanagement of MP/MLA funds, irregularities in allotting houses to the urban poor, corruption in the solid waste management department of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), among others.
“After retirement, I realised that I was receiving a good amount of pension and my children were settling. But what bothered me was society and corruption; which is when I decided to give it back to society in my own way of RTI activism. My goal was simple: to help RTI reach every common man and deliver justice,” said Guru.
Before forming a ‘coalition against corruption’ in the form of KRIA forum in 2004, Guru was associated with Consumer Care Society that was instrumental in creating awareness on Consumer Acts. He was also associated with the Public Affairs Centre that focused on children’s movement for civic awareness and Bala Janagraha movement that focused on creating awareness among the public and children to become active citizens.
Just like the saying ‘charity begins at home’, Guru’s first fight against misgovernance began in his own neighborhood in Banashankari in Bengaluru in 2004. Through RTI documents, he exposed the unauthorised buildings sprouting in his neighborhood.
The growing number of commercial buildings, including convention centers, were on the rise, which prompted Guru to seek RTI response on the establishment of such buildings. “RTI documents revealed that these buildings initially granted for residential purposes were being used for commercial purposes. In fact, the corporator of one of the wards also purchased a building to construct a marriage hall, violating all the by-laws,” said Guru. However, what followed was an attack on his house allegedly by the corporator’s men. Guru later filed a complaint with the then chief secretary of Karnataka on the attack, after which he got protection from the Bengaluru police department.
Later, Guru weaponized RTI as a medium to help deliver justice to the common man. As the KRIA forum got popularized, the group was bombarded with tons of complaints and grievances from the public.
One such impactful revelation by KRIA forum was exposing the housing department of Karnataka’s financial and allotment irregularities in the Ragigudda Slum Board project under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission. A housing project consisting of 1,500 houses with each housing costing Rs 2 lakh (wherein Rs 1.8 lakh was provided a subsidy by the state government while the rest needs to be contributed by beneficiaries), was marred by corruption.
Guru’s RTI response showed that the local leaders had allotted over 400 houses to a certain set of people as per their ‘whims and fancies’ which was in gross violation of building by-laws.
Further, Guru also alleged that the share of the amount given by the beneficiaries was not accounted for and the housing department instead gave written receipts as against the Demand Draft issued by the slum dwellers. “There was gross misappropriation of funds by the account officials of the housing department. As a result of our RTI expose, the government issued an order directing the housing department to form a selection committee for appropriate and effective allotment of housing to the urban poor,” said Guru.
Further, Guru also brought to light the building by-laws violation by multiple convention centers across Bengaluru. Guru alleged that many owners of convention centers used the basement for dining and kitchen purposes rather than for parking, in violation of building by-laws. His RTI documents revealed that 110 out of 170 convention centers were using the basement for purposes other than parking.
The RTI chief information commissioner directed BBMP to frame Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) on acting against such violations as and when complaints were reported. In the Solid Waste Management department of BBMP, the garbage trucks travel at least 15 km outside the city to dump waste. But the contractors complained of resistance from villagers who were against dumping waste near their villages. Later, a clause was included in the contract that enabled BBMP to pay extra for the contractors for dumping garbage outside the city.
However, Guru filed an RTI which revealed that the contractors had over invoiced the BBMP that was approved and certified by the BBMP medical officers. An excess of Rs 8 crore of public money was spent, revealed Guru’s RTI documents.
“If the garbage truck traveled 15 km, the contractors invoiced it for 80 km. This is corruption to a big extent and misutilization of public money. After the RTI expose, the Bangalore Metropolitan Task Force under the BBMP ordered the recovery of the excess payment from the contractors. Unfortunately, no action was taken against the corrupt officials who approved the payment,” Guru mentioned.
Despite being an active RTI activist for 20 years, Guru believes that with integrity of many information commissioners in question and the information commission department only becoming opaque, it will discourage a lot of citizens, especially youngsters, from taking up RTI activism.
“Earlier the information commission officers had the integrity and directed the respective departments to take action against officials if found guilty. But now, the officers themselves are corrupt and are withholding crucial information. This only discourages active citizens, especially youngsters from filing an RTI and such a trend is only causing a blot on the institution,” said Guru, who quit KRIA forum in 2020 after meeting with a major accident.
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