— Oinam Anand *
One Mr Prasanta of Bishnupur district, Manipur is the man who has got the distinction of being the first man benefited under the Right to Information Act.
Last year, Prasanta appeared in the written test for recruitment to the post of Sub-Inspector and Jamadar in Manipur Police and IRB. He failed in the written test and did not qualified for Viva-voce. On his disbelief of the result of the written examination he applied a formal request to the State Police Information Officer of the Home Department pleading to let him see his answer script and marks allotted in favour of his written answers and know his actual marks secured in the written test. His application was turned down by the authorities concerned. This made Prasanta approach the State Information Commissioner with the grievances.
The Information Commissioner after hearing the case directed the SPIO of the Home Department to make arrangements so that the applicant has the opportunity to see his answer script. This was supposed to be within April 30th, failing which a fine of Rs 250 per day will be paid by the SPIO until the latter fulfils the directives of the commission. On the very next day of the judgement of the State Information Commission, Manipur, the Central Information Commissioner had directed the UPSC that the candidate should be informed about the cut-off mark of civil services (Preliminary) examination.
This directive, the decision of the commission - was also upheld by the Delhi High Court. This episode of Mr Prasanta seeking his Right to Information and the subsequent directives of the authority will serve as an eye opener for the information-starved people of this country in general and more particularly to the people of Manipur, where there is no transparency and accountability in the administration.
The Right to Information Act clearly says that it would be obligatory on civil servants to give or share information sought by a citizen unless it is prejudicial to the interest of the country or results in a breach of privilege of Parliament or State Legislature. Under this Act any citizen of India has the right to seek information on any matter if it does not breach the security and interest of the country and privileges of the Parliament and State Assemblies. The State has to respond within 30 days of the petition.
The Act has the extent to Central, State Governments, Panchayati Raj institutions, local bodies, NGOs and recipients of Govt grants. While we are trying to get information from the authority in matter of public importance or in matter of personal grievances, one main point we should always bear in our mind is that the information we want from the authorities concerned will almost in all cases be a prickle in the hot sun to the authorities. Most often an information seeker may get excuses for delays. His request may be made to the deaf ears. But, the Right cannot be denied for long. Meaningful information can only be extracted if a person persists despite his patience being stretched to the limit.
Application seeking information from the Government liable to be rejected on very occasion if the request for information is worded as question - apparently the way to get around this is to turn the question format into a statement format. For example, if a citizen wants to know the detailed information about the repairing of road in front of CC Hr Sec School using this RTI Act, then the following differences in seeking information should be noted.
'Why has the road stretch in the portion of Sanjen-thong to CC Hr Sec School been so poorly repaired?' It is not a statement seeking information but it is question. It is to be rejected, instead if the question turns into such a statement like 'I would like to know why the portion of the Road from Sanjenthong to CC Hr Sec School has been so poorly repaired' then the authority concerned is bound to reply.
This Right to Information or Right to Know is a universally accepted tenet. Right to freedom of speech or Right to express is meaningless if it is not accompanied by the Right to secure all informations on matter of public welfare or on matters of public concern from the relevant public authorities. This right to know or Information is an input act while the Right to Speech or expression is an act of output function. So, if a voter gets the information about how to utilise MLA, Local Area Development Fund, then there will be no need for occupying space in the newspapers with words of praise for the Minister or MLA.
We must stop this sycophancy. Instead we must seek the balance sheet from the MLAs and Ministers about the source of fund for the development works, about the income and expenditure and the details of the work undertaken in the constituency and check periodically. This will be a good harvest for this RTI Act. The Right to Information is not free from excuses. Information relating to the security and intelligence agencies of the country are kept out from its purview while making them subject to disclosure in cases of allegation of corruption.
Other exemptions in the matter of giving information can also be set aside on the basis of a public benefit test when the benefit of release of information outweighs the harm that can be caused by disclosure of the same. In the proposed Right to Information bill before it came to an act there was provision for penalty of imprisonment against the erring officials. Amendments in the Bill have done away with the penalty of imprisonment to department proceedings in the event of failure to disclose information.
Again, in the present Act, if an official is found to have violated by not furnishing the information as demanded by a citizen, the official has also got the right to appeal against the petition to a 'third party' to which the official turn to who constitute the third party is not clearly indicated and there is possibility of a collusion between the erring official and 'the third Party' which may thereby delay or be dangerous from the affected citizen's point of view and his ambiguity can defeat the very purpose of this Right to Information Act.
* Oinam Anand writes regularly for The Sangai Express. This article was webcasted on May 15th, 2007.
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