A South Gujarat tribal youth uses RTI, ensures his remote village gets good road, power, education, transport

A tribal village in Dediyapada

By Pankti Jog*
Bharsingh Vasava, a tribal youth from the backward Narmada district, is proving to be a tough fighter against bureaucratic inertia. And, the tool he has been using is the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, amidst heavy odds. Belonging to South Gujarat's tribal village Samor, 40 km from Dediyapada town of South Gujarat, the place where he lives was devoid of regular transport. Even today it is devoid of mobile or telephone connectivity.
However, all this did not prevent Bharsingh from using RTI to make government accountable. A tribal farmer, he has a small piece of land that he got from his father. He has been using RTI despite the fact that, due to non-availability of educational facilities in his or nearby the village, he could not continue his education beyond seventh standard.
“I see many problems in my village. We hardly get benefit of any government programmes. Being the last village of Dediyapada taluka, the government officers have not paid much attention to us. But when I came to know about RTI Act, I tried it to seek information regarding the bus service, its irregularity, action taken by government, the rules, etc.", he says.
"Even before I was given any information on the basis of the RTI application, the driver and the conductor of the bus coming to my village were transferred to a different route. After this, the bus services improved by 80%, if not completely”, he states.
In the year 2010 Samor got a concrete road. However, Bharsingh observed that the material used was of poor quality. This was brought to the notice of the taluka development officer (TDO) but this was of no use. In the next rainy season, the road got washed away.
This made Bharsingh seek, under RTI, details of tender, the materials used in the road, the inspection report by the engineer, and details about who supervised the work. He got information, which was contradictory to the ground realities, revealing bad quality of construction.
This made Bharsingh to complain with the State Vigilance Commissioner, who ordered an inquiry. Following the inquiry, action was taken against the contractor, whose license was suspended for a year.
Samor village had electricity, but it was not extended to the nearby tribal halmet, or falia, where he lived. The issue was brought before the Gram Sabha many a time, yet there was no progress. Bharsingh filed RTI to know what actions were taken against the demand that falia dwellers had been raising. As no information was given, he approached the Gujarat Information Commission to a file complaint, after which a Gujarat government engineer was forced to apologise and provide power to the 217 families of the falia immediately.
In 2013, 11 checkdams were sanctioned in Dediyapada on the river for recharging groundwater. Five of these were made in 2013-14. However, Bharsingh found that low quality material had been used. Tender documents talked about putting sand and concrete, but only small and medium sized pebbles were used for constructing the checkdams.
The checkdams got washed away during the same year. This made Bharsingh use RTI, and on crosschecking once again, he found misappropriation. He simultaneously filed a complaint in the chief minister's online grievance redressal forum. Result: No contractor now wants to fill up tenders for rest for the check dams, as they fear that these might be strictly checked.
Teachers would be very irregular in reaching the village as well in the nearby villages. Whenever the sarpanch or other villagers would seek to know why, they would reply that they had to go to attend meetings at Dediyapada. Bharsingh filed RTI to seek information about their attendance, including on which the days and in which meetings the teachers had gone. “I was not given information, however teachers now come regularly”, he says.
Bharsingh, who is a regular caller on the Mahiti Adhikar Gujarat Pahel's (MAGP's) RTI helpline, learnt of the RTI through a Doordarshan programme. Currently, he is a torchbearer for ensuring good governance in his village and the falia. The helpline gets from 1300 to 1500 calls per month, and above 60% of these calls are from the rural areas. This suggests that villagers are keen to seek information about government functioning.

---

*With Mahiti Adhikar Gujarat Pahel, Ahmedabad

Comments

shailesh gandhi said…

My salute and compliments to MAGP and Bharsingh on this fantasic achievement.

August 01, 2015

GIRI Patel said…

I appreciate your writing skill, it seems you are well known about the topic and your explanation to the topic is very self explanatory. I really appreciate your skill of blogging.

I have shared your article to my FB Group and Delhi Govt Jobs

January 12, 2016

10,000 students deprived of classes as Ahmedabad school remains shut: MCC writes to Gujarat CM

By A Representative The Minority Coordination Committee (MCC) has written to Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, urging him to immediately reopen the Seventh Day Adventist School in Maninagar, Ahmedabad, where classes have been suspended for nearly two weeks. The MCC claims that the suspension, following a violent incident, violates the constitutional right to education of thousands of children.

Gujarat minority rights group seeks suspension of Botad police officials for brutal assault on minor

By A Representative A human rights group, the Minority Coordination Committee (MCC) Gujarat, has written to the Director General of Police (DGP), Gandhinagar, demanding the immediate suspension and criminal action against police personnel of Botad police station for allegedly brutally assaulting a minor boy from the Muslim community.

On Teachers’ Day, remembering Mother Teresa as the teacher of compassion

By Fr. Cedric Prakash SJ It is Teachers’ Day once again! Significantly, the day also marks the Feast of St. Teresa of Calcutta (still lovingly called Mother Teresa). In 2012, the United Nations, as a fitting tribute to her, declared this day the International Day of Charity. A day pregnant with meaning—one that we must celebrate as meaningfully as possible.

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

Targeted eviction of Bengali-speaking Muslims across Assam districts alleged

By A Representative A delegation led by prominent academic and civil rights leader Sandeep Pandey visited three districts in Assam—Goalpara, Dhubri, and Lakhimpur—between 2 and 4 September 2025 to meet families affected by recent demolitions and evictions. The delegation reported widespread displacement of Bengali-speaking Muslim communities, many of whom possess valid citizenship documents including Aadhaar, voter ID, ration cards, PAN cards, and NRC certification.

Gandhiji quoted as saying his anti-untouchability view has little space for inter-dining with "lower" castes

By A Representative A senior activist close to Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) leader Medha Patkar has defended top Booker prize winning novelist Arundhati Roy’s controversial utterance on Gandhiji that “his doctrine of nonviolence was based on an acceptance of the most brutal social hierarchy the world has ever known, the caste system.” Surprised at the police seeking video footage and transcript of Roy’s Mahatma Ayyankali memorial lecture at the Kerala University on July 17, Nandini K Oza in a recent blog quotes from available sources to “prove” that Gandhiji indeed believed in “removal of untouchability within the caste system.”

'Govts must walk the talk on gender equality, right to health, human rights to deliver SDGs by 2030'

By A Representative With just 64 months left to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), global health and rights advocates have called upon governments to honour their commitments on gender equality and the human right to health. Speaking ahead of the 80th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), experts warned that rising anti-rights and anti-gender pushes are threatening hard-won progress on SDG-3 (health and wellbeing) and SDG-5 (gender equality).

Is U.S. fast losing its financial and technological edge under Trump’s second tenure?

By Dr. Manoj Kumar Mishra* The United States, along with its Western European allies, once promoted globalization as a democratic force that would deliver shared prosperity and balanced growth. That promise has unraveled. Globalization, instead of building an even world, has produced one defined by inequality, asymmetry of power, and new vulnerabilities. For decades, Washington successfully turned this system to its advantage. Today, however, under Trump’s second administration, America is attempting to exploit the weaknesses of others without acknowledging how exposed it has become itself.

What mainstream economists won’t tell you about Chinese modernisation

By Shiran Illanperuma China’s modernisation has been one of the most remarkable processes of the 21st century and one that has sparked endless academic debate. Meng Jie (孟捷), a distinguished professor from the School of Marxism at Fudan University in Shanghai, has spent the better part of his career unpacking this process to better understand what has taken place.

Counterview

Search This Blog