National Convention on RTI and NREGA opens in
Lucknow
A two day convention on Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, and National
Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) began today at Gandhi Bhawan, Lucknow
under the aegis of National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) and National
Campaign for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI). Activists and common
citizens who have used the RTI Act to access information came to attend this
convention from all over UP, as well as, from other parts of the country like
Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and Delhi. More than five hundred participants
were present. They shared their experiences with using this Act.
The highlight of the convention was the active participation by the Chief
Information Commissioner (CIC), UP, Mr Ranjit Singh Pankaj and Information
Commissioner, Mr Virendra Saxena. It is noteworthy that any Information
Commissioner in UP has come out after a gap of two years to interact with
people
on an open platform. Activist groups have been trying to engage the Information
Commission as well as the administration to ensure proper implementation of the
RTI Act, as well as, effective coordination between the Information Commission
and the public at large. However, the administration had chosen not to
participate in the past.
The issues raised by activists and citizens include: no response from Public
Information Officers (PIOs) within the stipulated 30 days, lack of proper
information and training at the level of PIOs, inactive role played by First
Appeal Authority, First Appeal Authorities tend to protect the PIOs of their
department, harassment of applicants at the level of PIOs sometimes leading to
registration of criminal cases against them, large pendency in Information
Commission, applicants have to make a number of visits to the Commission, PIOs
not penalized under Section 20 of the Act which is mandatory and even if they
are penalized the fine is not realized, non-compliance of Section 4(1)(b) by
various departments. The inefficient functioning at the levels of PIOs and
First
Appeal Authority creates huge volume of complaints and appeals at the level of
the Information Commission.
The CIC agreed that applicants should not be harassed by the PIOs and should
not avoid fulfilling their responsibility by giving lame excuses. People also
lamented the fact the PIOs come to the Commission at government’s expense
whereas the applicants have to bear the expenses from their pockets.
Shri Pankaj, the CIC, assured that he would streamline the working of the
Commission and would solve all the problems faced by applicants in the next 6
months.
Tomorrow, former IAS officer, Magsaysay Awardee and a noted social activist
Aruna Roy and senior social activist Nikhil De will participate in this
convention and give a boost to people’s campaign to ensure the effective
implementation of the two Acts - RTI and NREGA. Commissioner, Rural
Development,
Mr Manoj Kumar Singh, will also attend the NREGA session in the afternoon to
interact with labourers and activists.
Former IPS officer and vice president of People's Union for Civil Liberties
(PUCL) SR Darapuri, noted author of books on RTI Dr Niraj Kumar, Izhar Ansari,
Devdutt Sharma, journalist Akhilesh Saxena, Bahnu Pratap Dwivedi, noted RTI
activist Urvashi Sharma, social activist Chunnilal, and Magsaysay Awardee
(2002)
and national convener of NAPM - Dr Sandeep Pandey had chaired the sessions of
the first day of the two days convention.
- National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) and National
Campaign for People's Right to Information (NCPRI)
New Email names for you!
Get the Email name you've always wanted on the new @ymail and @rocketmail.
Hurry before someone else does!
http://mail.promotions.yahoo.com/newdomains/aa/
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
