Whispers Forum

The peoples' assessment of the RTI Act is that it is collapsing under its own weight. The offices of Information commissions at the centre and States are considered a burden on the State exchequer. The political dispensations have started tinkering with the service conditions of central and States information commissioners in matters of age of appointment, retirement/ premature retirement, salary structures, dismissals etc. Lateral appointment of commissioners into RTI mainstream, will damage the transparency movement. Principle of seniority is not followed. Any officer, who does not fall in line, can be shunted out as a contractual employee. The pliable commissioners continue with all privileges.The Satark Nagrik Sangathan, a citizens' group working to promote transparency and accountability, reporting on the performance of the 29 Information Commissions set up under RTI Act across the country, has exposed dismal state of affairs of most commissions. While the State Information Commissions of Tripura and Jharkhand have been lying defunct, others are functioning with truncated strengths. Large backlog of pending cases. No wonder, about 3.14 lakh applications are reportedly pending in various information commissions. Added to this is the tendency on part of several commissions to return about 50% of the complaints without any speaking orders. It is an open secret that orders of CIC and SICs are not being implemented by government organisations. The tardy pace of disposal of applications by the commissioners has harmed the RTI movement irrevocably that was launched with massive fanfare in 2005. There is no security for RTI applicants who are under threats from those who are adversely impacted. The downfall of RTI Act 2005 started when political parties were exempted from sharing information. The office of Registrar General of SC was however, brought under the purview of RTI Act 2005.Exemption of SC judiciary was justified. The practice of taking prior consent of the third party(affected party) for sharing his/her information with the applicant, was regressive. The investigative agencies and Armed forces were exempted due to national security concerns. Reluctance to impose penalty on PIOs for non-compliance, continues unpunished with impunity. There is no system to regularly monitor the performance of information commissions across the country with the objective of strengthening the RTI regime. Majority of Commissioners are retired bureaucrats with 10% women. Perhaps, appointing more and more women as heads of CIC and SICs, would help in streamlining the system. Whispersinthecorridors's ‘ Date with RTI’,no doubt, is performing commendable job by increasing public awareness through daily reporting of RTI cases .
A K Saxena (a former civil servant)
Hearty congratulations on setting a new record. Hope to hit 500crore soon.
Dr Sushil Trivedi

The Information Commission is poorly handling the appeals and not entertaining them. The epidemic was indeed catastrophic and a little laxity should have been permitted rather than going by strict standards. The Commission is rarely seen as strict when it comes to the question of finding delay and imposing penalty. The facts should be examined on merits and not on technicalities. Will the information commission change the ways in the New Year?
Sukhvir Singh
Go whispers go... go.. go! You are the lone runner. Reach 500crore! Hit fast.
B P Pandey IAS (Retd)

With Sino American relations at its lowest ebb or point in decades, fears are mounting that tensions, especially over Taiwan, could erupt into violent conflict, it can be now, may be soon or any moment when boiling point is high. The recent events especially on the Ukraine front, where both Sino Russians united in invisible form, show that the United States and China spiral into “strategic competition" caused by "structural dynamics, which continue to drive the two countries towards an incredibly dangerous rivalry." A rising power has "ended up at war with the established power" in 12 to 16 cases over the past century-and the USA-China rivalry do not seem to meet the conditions of joining the minority. "For now", it can be concluded "the sino-American cold war is certainly growing colder, but a hot war over Taiwan may well be coming”. Any time this fire or volcano can erupt, more likely when China tries to forcibly lay claim on Taiwan. Wish this happens sooner than later, it's in India's interests that a weak China emerged after this volcanic event between Sino-America.
Harish Kumar

The appellant prayed that the delay in filing the second appeal of one year may be condoned as the same was caused due to Covid pandemic in the country. The CIC observed that the second appeal has been filed after the lapse of the laid down timeline as per Section 19(3) of the RTI Act. The reason cited by the appellant cannot be accepted as a sufficient cause preventing the appellant from filing his second as the period from September 2020 to March 2021, the peak time of Covid-19, was already over and all the offices were functioning with basic staff. In the absence of any valid reason/sufficient cause preventing the appellant from filing the appeal in time, it is appropriate to consider the case as time barred under Sec 19(3) of the RTI Act. The Commission held that the appellant has failed to give a sufficient justified cause explaining delay in preferring the second appeal, hence, the appeal is considered as time barred under Section 19(3) of the RTI Act and accordingly, dismissed without going into the merits of the case.
Comments
Section 19(3) of the RTI Act provides a time limit of 90 days to file an appeal before the Information Commission and an appeal may be admitted after the expiry of the period if the Information Commission is satisfied that the appellant was prevented by sufficient cause from filing the appeal in time.
Citation: Bakulkumar Vaghela v. Directorate General Defence Estate, File no.: CIC/DIGDE/C/2021/142789, Date of Decision: 17.11.2022
Dr Anuradha Verma (dranuradhaverma@yahoo.co.in) is a RTI Consultant currently working with IIM Visakhapatnam. She has co-authored the books, RTI Right to Information - Law and Practice and PIO’s Guide to RTI. She offers consultancy on RTI matters and Third party audit. Her other articles can be read at the website of RTI Foundation of India at the link www.rtifoundationofindia.com

The news of the passing away of revered Heera Ba the mother of Prime Minister Modi was quite upsetting. A day earlier it was reported that she was recovering and her condition was stable. To me the images of these two mother and son whenever he went to meet her in Ahmedabad were so beautiful. Touching her feet and putting her hand on his head by way of blessing, she putting something in his mouth to eat and he reciprocating, she giving him some money as all elders do to the children brought back sentimental memories for me. All mothers do the same when children have left the house to lead their own lives, the men work for the girls after marriage .When they go home to meet their mother they get the similar type of treatment. These cherished images of love between mother and son will no longer be seen. May God give eternal peace to this wonderful mother. I will of course miss those beautiful images.
Aarti Khosla