Sharp rise in pending RTI cases with India's information commissions, top five states account for 77% of pendency

By A Representative
The Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, a Delhi-based advocacy group, in a new report has said, data accessed from 19 Information Commissions (ICs) show that there are 1.93 lakh pending second appeal and complaint cases of Right to Information (RTI), up from 1.10 lakh cases in 2015. Top five ICs accounting for 77% of the overall pendency are Maharashtra (41,537), Uttar Pradesh (40,248), Karnataka (29,291), Central Information Commission (23,989) and Kerala (14,253 cases).
Pointing out that pendency in Bihar, Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu is not known publicly, the report points out, Mizoram State Information Commission (SIC) received and decided only one appeal case in 2016-17. The report, called Rapid Review, has been released to mark the 25th anniversary of CHRI's work in India at the Open Consultation on the Future of RTI: Challenges and Opportunities, held in Delhi.
The report notes, there is no State Chief Information Commissioner (SCIC) in Gujarat since mid-January 2018. Maharashtra SIC is headed by an acting SCIC since June 2017. There is no Information Commission in Andhra Pradesh (after Telangana was carved out in June 2014), though the state government has assured the Hyderabad High Court that it will set up an SIC soon.
The report says, vacancies have reached at an all-time high, with more than 25% (109) of the 146 posts in the Information Commissions lying vacant. In 2015, as against 142 posts created, 111 Information Commissioners (including Chief Information Commissioners) were working across the country.
The report states, large-sized SICs have huge pendency. Thus, while 47% of the serving Chief Information Commissioners and ICs are situated in seven states -- Haryana (11), Karnataka, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh (9 each), Central Information Commission, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu (7 each) -- six of these Commissions are saddled with 72% of the pending appeals and complaints across the country.
The report continues, bias towards bureaucrats in appointments has grown, with 90% of the Information Commissions headed by retired civil servants. It adds, more than 43% of the Information Commissioners are from civil services background. "This is the trend despite the Supreme Court’s directive in 2013 to identify candidates in other fields of specialisation mentioned in the RTI Act for appointment", complains CHRI's senior RTI activist Venkatesh Nayak.
According to the report, only 8.25% of the serving SCICs and ICs are women. There are only nine women in all the Information Commissions put together, and of these, three are retired civil servants.
The report regrets, the websites of SICs of Madhya Pradesh and Bihar cannot be detected on any Internet browser, adding, the SICs of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh have not published any annual report so far. Jharkhand and Kerala SICs each have six pending annual reports. And Punjab has five and Andhra Pradesh, four pending reports.
Despite the absence of their latest annual reports, the Central Government (57.43 lakhs/5.74 million) and the State Governments of Maharashtra (54.95 lakhs/5.49 million) and Karnataka (20.73 lakhs/2.07 million) continue to top the list of jurisdictions receiving the most number of information requests, the report says, adding, Gujarat (9.86 lakhs) recorded more RTI applications than neighbouring Rajasthan (8.55 lakhs) where the demand for RTI has emerged from the grassroots.
It continues, despite having much lower levels of literacy, Chhattisgarh (6.02 lakh) logged more RTI applications than the 100% literate Kerala (5.73 lakhs). Despite being much smaller sized States, Himachal Pradesh (4.24 lakhs), Punjab (3.60 lakhs) and Haryana (3.32 lakhs) registered more RTI applications each than the geographically bigger State of Odisha (2.85 lakhs).

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

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.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Bihar’s land at ₹1 per acre for Adani sparks outrage, NAPM calls it crony capitalism

By A Representative The National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) has strongly condemned the Bihar government’s decision to lease 1,050 acres of land in Pirpainti, Bhagalpur district, to Adani Power for a 2,400 MW coal-based thermal power project.

Sardar Patel was on Nathuram Godse's hit list: Noted Marathi writer Sadanand More

Sadanand More (right) By A Representative In a surprise revelation, well-known Gujarati journalist Hari Desai has claimed that Nathuram Godse did not just kill Mahatma Gandhi, but also intended to kill Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Citing a voluminous book authored by Sadanand More, “Lokmanya to Mahatma”, Volume II, translated from Marathi into English last year, Desai says, nowadays, there is a lot of talk about conspiracy to kill Gandhi, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, but little is known about how the Sardar was also targeted.

Counterview

Search This Blog