CITIZENS ALERT...WAKE-UP...RTI IN DANGER Oct 26 2014 : The Times of India (Mumbai) RTI weakening? Only 4% of cases penalized Himanshi Dhawan New Delhi Information commissioners across the country are using a light touch to tackle RTI complaints sparing imposition of penalty in over 96% of the cases according to an independent study . Penalties have been imposed in just 3,870 or 3.72% of the cases between January 2012 to December 2013 in 21 information commissions across the country . Activists say that commissions are turning a blind eye to delays or complete denial of information, which can sound the death knell for implementation of the RTI act. There are three million RTIs filed every year but only a fraction reach up to the level of appeal. The RaaG-NCPRI study on the RTI act reveals that between January 2012 to December 2013 3.89 lakh complaints and appeals were received by the Central Information Commission and 25 information commissions. Of these 3.06 lakh or 79% were disposed off. Based on RTI responses from 21 information commissions, the study found that 2.21 lakh cases had been disposed of between January 2012 to November 2013. Analysis of orders suggests that penalty should have been imposed on 1.04 lakh cases but in fact information commissions imposed it only on 3,870 cases. Maharashtra imposed penalty in the maximum number of cases (844) while the quantum of penalty—Rs 1.27 crore-was the highest in Karnataka.
Posted on: Sun, 26 Oct 2014 04:45:06 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015