Allotment of Plot under DQ and Lottery in favour of Minister/MLA/IAS/IPS/IFS officers

Allotment of Plot under Discretionary Quota / Lottery in favour of Minister/MLA/IAS/IPS/IFS officers by BDA

RTI Application was submitted to PIO, office of BDA seeking information about details of plot allotted under Discretionary Quota / Lottery in favour of Minister/MLA/IAS/IPS/IFS officers by BDA. The PIO   has supplied the following information on dated 25.6.16.

Sl.No.	Scheme	Name of allottees	Asset No.	Mode of allotment	Year of allotment	Remarks
1	Kalinga Nagar Plotted  Development Scheme	Bishnupada Sethi, IAS	K9B-137	Discretionary Quota	2007
2	DO	Krustan Ch. Badu, IAS	K7-629	DO	2003	Transferred to  Soumen Kumar Badu  by way of Gift on 30.5.2009
3	DO	Maheswar Naik, MLA	K8-618	DQ	1996	Transferred to Smita Patnaik on 22.7.2000
4	DO	Ujal Singh Bhatia, IAS	K9B-502	DQ	1996
5	DO	Alaka Panda, IAS	K8-B	DQ	1996
6	DO	Ram Ch. Pradhan, MLA	K8-123	DQ	1996
7	DO	Bijay Kumar  Nayak, MLA	K9B-19B	DQ	1996
8	DO	Goutam Kumar Das, IAS	K7-37	DQ	1996
9	DO	Dillip Ku. Samantaray, IAS	K8-311	DQ	1996
10	DO	G. Mohan Kumar, IAS	K8-72	DQ	1996	Transferred to  Amar Ku.  Mohanty & Manashree Mishra o 22.10.13
11	DO	Reena Mitra, IAS	K9B-129	DQ	1996
12	DO	Nilanjan Sanyal, IAS	K8-112	DQ	1996
13	DO	Arundaya Swain, IAS	K9B-148	DQ	1996
14	DO	Sobhana Ku. Patnaik, IAS	K9B-216	DQ	1996
15	DO	Satyajit Mohanty, IPS	K9B-389	DQ	1996	Transferred to Sanjiv Valla and Rajiv Valla on 5.1.01.
16	DO	Janak Digal, IAS	K8-1182	DQ	1996	Transferred to Tusar  Ranjan sahu on 25.2.10
17	DO	Hawasingh Chahar, IAS	K9B-101	DQ	1997	Transferred  to Jayant Ku. Pradhan on 12.11.12
18	DO	Santosh Ku. Sarangi, IAS	K9A-224	DQ	1996
19	DO	Umesh Chandra Sarangi, IPS	K9B-134	Lottery	1995

Remarks:

a.I am under impression that  the information  provided by BDA is still incomplete.  Many information have been kept secret.  But our effort still continues to extract more information about allotment of land.

b. BDA is still maintaining secrecy about notice issued to the people who have taken land under DQ and filling false affidavit.

c.  The Statement  of  Chief Secretary  that  total  no. of  11 plots have been  recovered  from  the people   is still  found false and misleading. Because,  BDA has denied to provide this information.  

Pradip Pradhan

M-9937843482

Date- 29.8.16 

Success Case Study on RTI

Case Study

RTI- An Instrument empowering Common people to fight out corruption at grass-root level

Apprehending corruption and irregularities in development projects undertaken in Marthapur Gram Panchayat of Balipatna Block under Khurda district of Odisha,   a group of people submitted complaint to   District Collector, Khurda in his Grievance Cell on 24^th August 2015 and BDO, Balipatna Block demanding an enquiry into it. Following order of the Collector and subsequent request of BDO, Balipatna, the District Panchayat Officer, Khorda wrote a letter No. dt. 603/GP, dated 7.9.15  to  the Sub-Collector, Bhubaneswar  to  depute  Sub-Divisional Panchayat Officer to  conduct an enquiry  of Marthapur Gram Panchayat to detect  details of  funds misappropriated  by  the personnel and furnish   a Report.

In the meantime,  series of  RTI Applications were submitted by Pandab Pradhan, Manoj Swain, grass-root RTI Activists  associated with Odisha Soochana adhikar Abhijan ( a state-level forum of Activists sprearheading campaign for  effective  implementation of RTI Act in Odisha  )  to the PIO, office of Marthapur Gram Panchayat, BDO, Balipatna to  get the information about  the following  works undertaken, project sanctioned, fund utilized with copy of  bill and vouchures   under  different schemes like  fund sanctioned under State Finance Commission,  Twelfth Finance Commission, Gopabandhu Gramin Yojana, GP Fund etc. from 2013-14 to 2015-16 .

i.      Talapadia Harijan Sahi Drain & CC Road

ii.    Construction  of Cement Concrete  Road  at Badakuda Thakurani Pitha & Construction of Giri Gobardhan Pitha

iii.   Cement Concrete Road from house of Antaryami Pradhan to Bharat Pradhan House.

iv.  Cement Concrete Road  from  house of Laxmidhar  Pradhan to  Gangadhar Pradhan House

v.    Renovation of Gram Panchayat Office.

 

It was assessed by the villagers that   the entire sanctioned amount around Rs. 30 lakhs has been   misappropriated by Panchayat executive Officer, Sarapanch and Contractors by making false Bill and vouchures.

However, though the information was provided by the concerned PIOs, it was found incomplete and RTI Application was also not responded in the absence of records.   It was highlighted in media exposing huge corruption in Gram Panchayat which drew the attention of the authorities.

As per request of District Panchayat Officer, the SDPO conducted enquiry investing all the records and documents , making spot inspection  of all the works shown in file as completed   with cooperation of the  villagers  in October and November,2015 and  produced the report 0n 24.12.16. with following note of observation and recommendation.

1.    The amount of  Rs. 43,000.00  and Rs. 23,000.00  withdrawn  on 6.1.2015  and 19.1.2015  from SFC  account  has been expended  in beautification  of GP  and purchase of furniture  without any estimate, administrative approval,  technical sanction. Both Sarapanch and Ex-PEO are jointly responsible for it.

2.     The  amount of  Rs. 28,000.00  withdrawn  on 14.11.14  from TFC  account  for payment of honourarium  of Sarapanch  and Naib Sarapanch & S.A., D.A. of members  of GP. But no payment is done and the amount has been misappropriated.

3.    The amount of Rs. 2, 75,154.00 has been illegally withdrawn from TFC account without any estimate, bill, measurement/ check measurement by any technical person. No administrative approval has been taken for the above three mentioned projects The projects have not been approved in the GP meeting.  The Sarapanch and Ex-PEO are jointly responsible for such illegal withdrawal of money.

Recommendation for Action

1.       Necessary disciplinary action may be taken against the Ex-PEO Sri Trilochan Nayak for his carelessness, negligence in Government duty and financial irregularities.

2.        Necessary disciplinary action also may be taken against the Sarapanch Smt.  Sandhyarani Pradhan for her negligence  in duty, misappropriation of  Government money, financial irregularities  and without following guideline, non-discharge of the duty properly as provided  under section 115 of O.G.P. Act, 1964.

Though the Report was produced to the Collector, no action was taken against the delinquent officials.  On 21.1.12016, RTI Application was  submitted  to the PIO, Office of Collector, Khurda  seeking copy of the  Enquiry report  and  Action taken  against the  officials  involved  in  misappropriation of report. On 27.2.16, the PIO   supplied the copy of the enquiry report  along with  a statement  that  “no  action  has been taken  against the delinquent regarding  irregularities  committed  in  the Gram Panchayat till yet”.

After  obtaining the information,  it was exposed  in media  highlighting  the content of the report  and Govt.’s dillydallying  to  take action against  the  delinquents.   Then the villagers staged Dharana in front of Balipatna Block office demanding immediate action against Sarapanch and Panchayat Extension officer and recovery of the money.  A delegation of RTI Activists and villagers also met   Commissioner-cum Secretary, Dept. of Panchayat Raj demanding action against them as per enquiry report.  This fight   took three months to yield the result.

Being  pressurized  by the  people  armed  with RTI  information,  the  district  administration  suspended  Sri Trilochan Nayak, Ex-PEO  and issued  show cause  notice  for  disciplinary  action. On 7.7.16, the Department of Panchayat Raj issued order dt. 7.6.16 under sub-section (2) of section-115 of Odisha Gram Panchayat Act, 1965 to place Smt. Sandhyarani pradhan, Sarapanch  of Marthapur GP  under suspension. 

Though the people got small victory after a long fight with the administration, the problem has not been solved. The money misappropriated has not been recovered from them till yet.  No disciplinary action has been taken against them.

Case Study Prepared by

Pradip Pradhan

State Convener, Odisha Soochana Adhikar Abhijan

M-9937843482 

Fund sanctioned to Media on “ATITHI DEVO BHAVA”

Fund sanctioned to Media by Govt. of Odisha for advertisement on “ATITHI DEVO BHAVA”

RTI Application was submitted to PIO, office of  Department of Tourism and Culture ( Tourism) seeking  information about  details of  fund sanctioned to  Electronics media   for  advertisement  of  Atithi Devo  Bhava ( incredible India Campaign)  and  name of the Artists  involved  in the programme. The information provided by the PIO  on 19.8.16  is as follows.

Year	Name of TV Channel	Campaign Cost(in lakhs)	Name of MP/MLA	Remarks
2011-12	M/s Prism TV Private  Limited , E-TV Oriya, Bhubaneswar	25.00	Sidhant Mohapatra	Two Short Film
	M/s OTV Network, C-1, Chandrasekhar Pur, Bhubaneswar	20.00	Akash Das  Nayak	One Short film
	M/s Kanak TV, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar	10.00	Anubhav Mohanty	One Short Film
2012-13	M/s Prism TV Private  Limited , E-TV Oriya, Bhubaneswar	25.00		2011-12 films were repeated  in 2012-13
	M/s OTV Network, C-1, Chandrasekhar Pur, Bhubaneswar	20.00
	M/s Kanak TV, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar	10.00
2014-15	M/s OTV Network, C-1, Chandrasekhar Pur, Bhubaneswar	100.00	Sri Prafulla Kar Sri Sudarsan Patnaik	Two Short Film
	M/s Prism TV Private  Limited , E-TV Oriya, Bhubaneswar	25.00	Sri Asru Mochan Mohanty	One Short Film
	M/s Kanak TV, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar	50.00	Miss Archita Sahu Sri Mihir Das Sri Sabyasachi Mohapatra	Four short film.
2015-16	M/s OTV Network, C-1, Chandrasekhar Pur, Bhubaneswar	25.00		2014-15  films were  repeated  in 2015-16
	M/s Kanak TV, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar	25.00
	M/s Zkalinga , Nayapalli, Bhubaneswar	12.50

Pradip Pradhan

M-9937843482

Date- 23.8.16

Citizen Report on Performance of Odisha Information Commission

Citizen Monitoring Report on “One Year Performance of Odisha Information Commission” from June 2015 to May 2016

·  Due to lack of knowledge, expertise and experience and sheer inefficiency, Odisha Information commissioners have miserably failed to give justice to the citizens.

·  Mrs. Sashi Prava Bindhani has devoted just 10 days for hearing in a month.

·  Disposal rate is very dismal leading to frustration among information seekers.

·  The contents of their decisions suffer from grammatical errors along with carrying no meaning at all.

·   Both the Information Commissioners dispose each just 2 cases   per month.

·   Both the Information Commissioners  draw salary of 2 lakhs  per month which is a great loss to state exchequer.

As per section 18, 19, 20 of RTI Act, the Information Commission is empowered  is empowered  to  hear and dispose  Second Appeal petitions and Complaint  Cases, ensure availability of information  to appellants/ complainants, impose penalty on defaulting PIOs and award compensation  to aggrieved  Information Seekers.  Besides that  the  Information  Commission  is required  to publish Annual Report for every year,  recommendation for reform to Public Authority, if any required for development, improvement,  modernisation,  reform or amendment to this Act   under section 25  of the Act.

Keeping it in view, RTI Application was filed by Sri Sanjay Sahu, RTI Activists and member of Odisha Soochana Adhikar Abhijan to the PIO, Office of Odisha Information Commission seeking information about details of days spent by each Information Commissioner for hearing of the case, total no. of complaint case heard ad disposed by Each IC, penalty imposed, compensation awarded and number of cases still pending for disposal from June 2015 to May 2016. It needs to be mentioned here that   both the Information Commissioners were appointed in the second week of June 2015.

On 13.7.16, In response to RTI Application, the PIO supplied the required information which is as follows.

1. No. Of days  devoted  for hearing by  both  the Information commissioners  from June 2015 to  16^th May 2016

12 Months	No. of days devoted  for hearing
	Sri L.N.Patnaik, SIC	Ms. Sashi Prava Bindhani, SIC
	185	128
Average days  devoted for hearing  in a month	15	10

Analysis:- In an average while Sashi Prava Bindhani  spends just 10 days  in a month  for hearing, Sri  L. N. Patnaik devotes   only 15 days in a month.  God Knows what they are  doing rest of the days  in a month. 

2.       No. of Complaint/ Second Appeal Cases  heard  and disposed

Though  both of the State Information Commissioners ( SICs)   got  appointment  in second week of June,15 ,  but they started hearing of the case  in August, two months  later  of their appointment. So the analysis  of  the cases heard  and disposed  has been made  for 10 months  ( from August  2015  to May 2016). 

	No. of Complaint/ Second Appeal Cases  heard  and disposed
	Complaint cases heard	Complaint cases disposed	Second Appeal cases heard		Second Appeal cases disposed		Total cases heard ( both Complaint and SA)	Total cases disposed ( both complaint and Second Appeal)
L.N.Patnaik, SIC	157	27	1163		291		1320	318
Sashi  Prava Bindhani, SIC	Month-wise figure has not been cunningly  provided     by the PIO						1456	269
Division Bench ( both the SICs sit together)	28	1		568		80	596	81

 ( N.B.- While analysing this figure,  the no. of cases heard and disposed  in Division  Bench  was  divided  between two SICs   in order  to arrive  at conclusion  about  no. of cases heard and disposed  by each of them )

Analysis:

a.In an average, Sri L.N.Patnaik, SIC hears 162 cases (132 own cases + 30 cases in Division bench) and disposes 35 cases (31 own cases + 4 Division bench)  in a month.  If  devotion of 15 days  for hearing of the case in a month by Mr. Patnaik  is  taken into  account, Sri Patnaik hears only 10 cases  per day  and disposes only  2 cases in a day.

b. Sashi Bindhani  hears 175 cases ( 145 own case + 30 cases in Division)  per month and disposes  31 cases  ( 27 own + 4  cases in division bench)  per month.  If  15 days is taken into account for hearing of the case in a month,  then Smt. Bindhani  hears only  11 cases   and disposes  only two cases in a day.

It needs to be noted here that Maharashtra Chief Information commissioner is disposing around 5000 cases in a year. It means   disposing 419 cases in a month. Similarly Central Information Commissioner is disposing each around 3300 cases in a year.  But Odisha Information Commissioners are disposing just around 350 cases in a year.

3.       Penalty:

Within one year of their functioning, while Sri L.N.Patnaik, SIC has imposed penalty against erring PIO in 23 cases, Smt. Bindhani, SIC imposes penalty on a single case and Division Bench has imposed penalty in PIOs in four cases which is less than four percent of total cases disposed by them   in which RTI Act was violated and the information denied.  The penalty has been imposed on lower level functionaries like clerks, Cashier, PEO etc. 

4.       Compensation

Both the Information Commissioners have not awarded any compensation under section 19 (8b) to any  aggrieved Citizen who had filed the cases after taking a lot of pains and hardships.

5.       Pendency

Around 5000 cases are pending in the commission for disposal since 3 years.  But this figure is doubtful.

6.          Language of the Decision

Mrs. Sashi Bindhani is very poor  in writing  English language  used in the content of the decisions. Let me refer  content of decision of a SA No.- 885/2014-

“ the Appellant  has filed  the Second Appeal memorandum  on 9.4.2014  alleging that  the  information sought  from the  PIO, O/0  the Chief District Medical Officer, Balasore through his RTI Application  dated 15.11.2013 in spite of  filling  of first appeal  petition  dated 16.12.2013”.   Does this sentence carry any meaning at all?

(Prepared  by Pradip Pradhan, M-9937843482,Date- 14.8.16)