Social activist and winner of Roman Magsaysay Award Sandeep Pandey has pitched for bifurcation of the Andhra Pradesh Information Commission.
“We are in favour of immediate division of the Andhra Pradesh Information Commission. It is important from the point of view of pendency of cases. The immediate need is to divide the Commission into two separate bodies which would mean more number of Information Commissioners. For some strange reason, the A.P Reorganisation Act 2014 is silent on the status of the Commission. While many other commissions found place in the 10th schedule of the Act, APSIC was not mentioned,” he said.
Mr. Pandey also wants the free online certificate course on RTI offered by the Centre for Good Governance to be made mandatory for all Public Information Officers (PIOs), other officials and even schools and colleges. “This will pave the way for proper maintenance of records by department personnel who will be wary of the fact that these things can be asked for,” he said.
Disapproving of, what he calls, neglect of a crucial Act, he says the government “just does not care” because it’s a low priority area for it. “In fact, many in the government don’t want it because we find loopholes in the system,” he said while speaking to The Hindu on Sunday.
Mr. Pandey was in the city to attend a State-level meeting of RTI activists, jointly organised by United Forum for RTI Campaign and Educators in RTI Service.
‘The whole problem lies with the ‘mentality. The Act calls for a regime that facilitates transparency for spread of information, which is unfortunately not the case,” he says but goes on to add that the awareness-level on RTI in Andhra Pradesh is better than other states. “People here are asking tough questions, they are assertive; Information Commissioners are friendly and the Chief Information Commissioner regularly organises meetings.”
He found fault with the ‘ruler’ mentality of those at the helm of affairs and said it should transform into ‘servant’ mentality. Expressing satisfaction over the steady improvement in awareness on RTI, he says but “but the spirit of the Act has not been institutionalised”.
