The Hindu : Kerala / Kochi News : Centre’s order will ‘clip the wings of RTI institutions’

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Centre’s order will ‘clip the wings of RTI institutions’

Special Correspondent

KOCHI: A Central government directive that the information commissions set up under the Right to Information Act (RTI) should take decisions on complaints and appeals from the public collectively, and not individually, has RTI activists up in arms.

RTI activists around the country have strongly objected to the directive and launched an Internet campaign to get it rescinded.

They fear the directive will further weaken the institution of RTI and lead to the piling up of complaints and appeals before the commissions, thus causing the degeneration of the institution.

Last month, the Department of Personnel and Training in the Union Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions wrote to the Central Information Commission saying that the CIC and the State Information Commissions were not supposed to take decisions by constituting Benches of individual commissioners, but as a single body.

It noted that the Department of Legal Affairs, which it consulted, had opined that ‘Section 12(4)of the RTI Act does not empower the Chief Information Commissioner to constitute the Benches.’

“In view of this legal position, it is advised that decisions on the complaints and appeals should be taken by the Central Information Commission as defined in Section 2(b) of the RTI Act 2005, and not by the Benches of the commission.”

RTI activists dub the directive as “laughable, impractical and issued without first having done any field work.” They point out that all the information commissions in the country are flooded with complaints and appeals and that the commissions, even with the current functioning of Benches, are struggling to deal with them.

Each of the commissions in the States has between three to ten commissioners besides a chief information commissioner. In Kerala, for instance, there are three commissioners and a chief commissioner.

They hear complaints individually (as four separate ‘Benches’) in the same way as High Court judges function.

If the new directive is implemented, the three commissioners and the chief commissioner will have to sit together and take decisions jointly.

This will, in the first place, mean that only one fourth of the number of complaints currently heard will be taken up for hearing.

This will mean that the effectiveness of the commission is reduced to one-fourth. Secondly, if any of the commissioner is absent or on leave on a single day, the commission will not be able to hear complaints and take decisions.

RTI activists say that the directive was based on a narrow interpretation of the Section 2(b) of the RTI Act. They urge that until an amendment to the Act giving the CICs the power to constitute benches is made, the status quo should be continued.

Otherwise, they warn, the institution of information commissions will be drastically crippled.

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