Memorandum
submitted to Odisha Chief Information Commissioner for bringing reform in RTI
regime in Odisha
Dear friends
On 3.3.17, A five-member delegation of Odisha Soochana Adhikar Abhijan
(OSAA) met Sri Sunil Kumar Mishra,
Odisha Chief Information Commissioner
and submitted memorandum urging him to
reform RTI regime in Odisha and
brining changes in functioning of
Odisha Information Commission.
The Team Members appraised newly-appointed Chief Information Commissioner
about faulty RTI regime in Odisha like anti-people Odisha RTI Rules, absurd and
illegal RTI application form, illegal demand of production of proof of
citizenship which is the violation of section 6(2) of the RTI Act, arbitrary
introduction of Appeal form and fee etc.
which needs to be withdrawn. The
Commission was requested to exercise his power under section 25 (5) of the RTI
Act to direct the State Govt. to bring changes in Odisha RTI Rules and withdraw
illegal provision.
The Commission was enlightened about
huge pendency of 7000 cases, slow disposal of cases by the Commission and
lacunas in Odisha Information Commission (appeal procedure) Rules, 2006, long
delay in sending copy of decision of the cases by the Commission. RTI Activists requested the Commission to
take steps for hearing atleast 30 cases per day and disposing 300 cases
in a month by each commission,
cancellation of summer vacation and Puja vacation illegally enjoyed by the Commission, providing decision of the
commission in Odia language, hearing setion-4 related violation cases by the Commission, hearing of the cases
through video-hearing, giving
priority for hearing of public interest
related cases etc. The Commission was also requested that copy
of decision of the cases should be sent to the complainant at the
earliest.
Sri Mishra took positive view about concerned
expressed by RTI Activists and suggestions made by them. He assured the
team to
bring changes in Odisha RTI
Rules and functioning of the Commission. The Team members are quite hopeful and
reposed their faith on the assurance of
the Commission to see better implementation of RTI Act in Odisha
The members of
delegation team were Sri Pradip Pradhan, Sri Biswajit Mohanty, Mrs. Sanjukta
Panigrahi, Sri Srikant Pakal, Sri Prakash Samantsinghar.
Pradip Pradhan
M-9937843482
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Test
of Memorandum submitted to Odisha Chief Information Commissioner by Odisha
Soochana Adhikar Abhijan
To
Sri Sunil Kumar Mishra Date-
3.3.17
State Chief Information Commissioner
Toshali Bhawan, Satya Nagar
Bhubaneswar
Sub- Recommendation of RTI Activists for reform
in RTI regime in Odisha
Enforcement of RTI Act has completed about eleven years in Orissa as at national level and in
other States/UTs. At the outset, in the name of implementing the Act, Govt. of
Orissa unilaterally notified Orissa RTI Rules 2005, which was however strongly
opposed by Civil Society Groups who termed it as absurd, illegitimate, and
anti-people. Many eminent citizens and national level RTI activists like Mrs.
Aruna Ray, Mr. Sailesh Gandhi and Ms. Maja Daruwala of CHRI did also object to
quite some provisions of Orissa RTI Rules on the ground of their incongruity
with the parent law. Specifically, Mrs.Ray had met the Chief Minister Orissa in
Dec 2005 and pressed him to withdraw them at the earliest. Under the mounting
pressure from Civil Society Groups both at state and national level, the State
Govt. of Orissa on the floor of Assembly in April 2006 announced a bunch of new
provisions including reduction of fees on different heads, which was notified
in official gazette on 29th May 2006 under the caption ‘Orissa RTI
(amendment) Rules, 2006’.
The above amendments, though fair and useful in themselves, didn’t
however touch at all on the mainframe of Orissa RTI Rules 2005 (such as a
lengthy application form requiring disclosure of personal details and
attachment of a copy of voter card, forms and fees for making appeals, ), which in the opinion of civil society
groups was out and out ultra vires the parent Act and required therefore a
drastic overhaul. Since then Orissa has remained under the draconian spell of
the said Rules, on account of which the implementation of RTI Act continues to
suffer badly till today. It has been observed
by Civil Society Groups that ironically,
Orissa Information Commission, though empowered to suggest amendment to any
illegitimate feature contained in a State Rule under section 25 of the RTI Act,
has displayed themselves more enthusiastic to enforce the untenable
State Rules than the State Government itself. In the face of such adverse
scenario, the Civil Society Organisations and RTI Activists have been
constantly steering campaign for withdrawal of the main instrument
i.e. Orissa RTI Rules 2005 and amendment to two subsidiary instruments i.e.
Orissa Information Commission (Appeal Procedure) Rules 2006, through
different forums and activities.
We bring to
your notice these issues seeking
suitable direction of the Commission empowered under section 25 (5) of
the RTI Act to Govt. of Odisha to enforce
the RTI Act in letter and spirit
and bring reform in the functioning of Odisha Information Commission.
1. Direction to amend Odisha RTI Rules, 2005
A.
Withdrawal of Application Form
Under
Section 6 of the RTI Act, a citizen seeking information is not required to
submit his/her application to the Public information Officer
in any particular form. But Orissa RTI Rules has prescribed a compulsory
11-point lengthy and complex application Form, without proper fill-up of which
one’s request for information shall not be entertained. Moreover, the
said Form requires an applicant to disclose several of his/her personal
information like identity as a citizen, permanent address, and spouse name,
which are as such prohibited from disclosure under Section 6(2) of the Act. The
Central Govt. has not prescribed any Application Form as such, and some State
Governments who have prescribed Forms have not made them compulsory. The
present Form-A of Orissa is simply a burdensome provision for the people of
Orissa. After a lot of protest by RTI Activists, a high level committee under chairmanship
of Sri Surya Narayan Patro, the then
Minister, I and PR Dept. was held on 3.8.2011 for amendment of Odisha RTI
Rules. This Committee recommended for
amendment of Application Form. The
Application Form i.e. Form-A imposed by Govt. of Orissa should therefore be
withdrawn, and as in the case of Central Government, the citizens should be
allowed to make an application under the Act in the manner they like to.
B.
Complete withdrawal of appeal Form and
fees
There
is no provision in RTI Act to prescribe any Form or Fee for making
an appeal, first or second. The Central Govt. and many other State Governments
have therefore not prescribed any appeal form or fee. But the Govt. of Orissa,
in clear violation of the Act has prescribed both appeal form (Form D for 1st
Appeal and Form E for 2nd Appeal) and appeal fees (Rs.20/- for 1st
appeal and Rs.25/- for 2nd appeal). Besides the Orissa Rules
make it compulsory for such appeal fees to be deposited only through
Court Fee Stamps, to procure which is a great difficulty for the common
citizens. So the State Government should be directed to abolish both appeal
form and appeal fees so imposed.
C.
Withdrawal of
provision for submission of proof of
Citizenship
The provision made under the Orissa
Rules-2005( vide –Rule 4) that the Applicant has to satisfy
the PIO about his/her identity before his/her application is
considered, is ultravires the parent Act and needs to be withdrawn. The
Section 6 (2) of the RTI Act categorically says that an applicant “
shall not be required to give any reason for requesting the
information or any other personal details except
those may be necessary for contacting him”. It deserves to be mentioned here that the I and
PR Dept. issued a circular
Directing
to all Departments to comply order of Calcutta High Court to protect the
interest of whistle blowers.
D. Withdrawal
of Form-C
The Form –C (Intimation of Rejection) as it
stands now is not only prohibitive of people’s right to
information, but also ultravires the mother law. It needs to
be struck off. The section 7(1) of the RTI Act says that a request for
information can be rejected for any of reasons specified
in Section 8 and 9 only. But the Form-C in its column
(i) without specifying the particular reasons under the said
sections, mentions just in a blanket, roughshod manner that it
comes under exempted category covered under sections 8 and 9 of the Act. Similarly,
the Column (iv) spaciously saying that “the information is
contained in published material available to the public and quoting
it as a ground for rejection carries no meaning for
the citizen at all. Again, the column (vi) saying “ The information
sought for is prohibited as per section 24(4) of the
Act is negatively slanted against the citizen’s quest for information,
since the said section permits the information relating to cases of
corruption and human rights violation to be disclosed albeit
after getting the approval of the Information Commission. So instead of
saying just “no”, the said column might say, “Your application has been
forwarded to the Information Commission for their opinion “. The
Column (vii) saying that “ The information would cause
unwarranted invasion of privacy of any person is absolutely
redundant , since the factor is covered under section 8(1j),
already taken care of by the column (i) mentioned above. Thus
the Form-C is ultravires the mother Act for the reasons already
shown above.
E. Withdrawal
of provision of submission of proof of Identity
Rule-2
(e) ‘Identity’- The given definition
which requires an applicant to show the evidence of his ‘citizenship like an electoral photo identity card, a passport or any
other document which can satisfy the authority about the citizenship of the
person’ needs to be altogether abolished, as it is ultra vires the
parent Act, which under Section 6(2)
says inter alia that a citizen is not required to give ‘any other personal details except those that may be necessary for
contacting him’.
F. Rule- 4 Procedure to obtain
information-
(i)
Mode of payment of application fee shouldn’t be confined to only cash or
treasury challan. Various modes of payment like IPO, Money Order, Demand Draft
and Banker’s Cheque should be allowed in addition to the above two.
(ii) The provision that the PIO needs to be ‘satisfied with the identity of the
applicant’ before sending his letter of intimation to the applicant in
Form-B should be abolished, since it contravenes the above mentioned Section
6(2) of parent Act. Moreover, the PIO in his letter of intimation to the
applicant should not only inform ‘the
amount of cost for providing information’ but also its detail break-up and
mode of calculation along with ‘information
concerning his or her right with respect to review the decision as to the amount of fees charged or the form of
access provided, including the particulars of the appellate authority, time
limit, process and any other form’ as
required under Section 7(3) of Act.
An
addition to be made here is that the persons belonging to BPL families should
be exempted from all manner of fees towards the cost of information as required
under Section-7(5) of Act.
(iii)
The
limitation of 15days from the date of receipt by the applicant of PIO’s letter
of intimation, within which the applicant is required to deposit the
amount towards cost of information should be abolished, and in its place, a
limitation of 7 days from the date of the receipt of the application, within
which the PIO should send his letter of intimation in Form-B to the applicant,
should be inserted.
2. Commission to write all decisions and
correspondences in Odia language-
Under
Section 4(4) of the RTI Act, all proactively disclosed information {section
4(1b)} should be disseminated in local language. The decisions of the
Commission as these are in the nature of suo motu disclosures provided under
Section 4 of the Act, need to be written and published in Odia language. Again, it is astonishing that
the Information Commissioners are making all correspondences with
the semi-literate Complainants
and appellants of the State in English which creates a lot of hindrance for the people in following the letters
and decisions of the Commission.
Moreover, even the English language used by the Commissioners in their orders
suffers from a lot of grammatical and
technical errors. The Information Commissioners also lack efficiency and skill to write the decisions
properly. So it is requested that the
Information Commissioners be directed to make all their correspondence and
decisions in Odia language, to enable the Odia knowing people to understand
them. It deserves to be mentioned here that while adjudicating WP (C) No.
19857/2013, the hon’ble High Court has given direction to State Govt. to
appoint Odia translators for office of Odisha Information Commission. As per the information obtained under RTI,
the State Govt. jas already given appointment of Odia translator in the office
of Comission.
3.Summer Vacation and Puja vacation
Leave taken by the Commission –
an arbitrary and illegal practice.
It has come to our notice that the Information Commissioners of the state use to
suspend hearing of the cases
and take leave for days together terming it as Summer Vacation Leave, Puja
Vacation leave and the like. Taking
leave as Summer Vacation or Puja vacation
is nowhere in practice in any office of quasi judicial bodies of the
country. As we know, Odisha Information Commission is a quasi-judicial body,
unlike the judicial bodies such as High Court or Supreme Court. No other
kindred Commissions like Odisha Human Rights Commission, State Commission for
Women or even Central Information Commission enjoy such statutory leave.
So we request your esteemed office to enquire into the matter, issue show cause
to the Information Commissioners
and pending the results of
enquiry deduct the dues payable against
the days of leave from their monthly salary and
allowances. Such deduction, which is
perfectly in tune with the principle of ‘no work, no pay’ would send a right
signal to the concerned Commissioners who have taken an illegal and arbitrary
leave on their own and have thereby set up a bad precedent.
4. Amendment of Odisha Information
Commission ( appeal procedure ) Rules,2006
A.
Rule-8
(Service of notice by the Commission)
A
proviso is to be added here that the
first hearing of a Complaint or an Appeal, as the case may be, shall be held
within 30 days of its registration, and a notice for the same shall be served
by the Commission to the concerned parties within 7 days of its registration,
unless the said case is earmarked for the purpose of an enquiry under Section
18(2) of the Act.
Another
addition to be made here is that every
notice to be so served shall be written in the regional language of the
state Oriya, and an English version of the same may be served along with
the Oriya version.
B. Rule-9
(Personal Presence of the appellant or complainant)
A
proviso shall be made here that in any
appeal proceedings the PIO, First Appellate Officer or the representative of
the concerned public authority, as the case may be, shall be given only one
opportunity to present himself in the hearing for discharging his burden of
proof, failing which he shall be
held guilty and therefore penalized as per Section 20 of the Act.
C. Rule-10
(Decision of the Commission)
An
addition is to be made here that the Commission
shall hold a maximum of 3 hearings to decide an Appeal or a Complaint, as
the case may be, within a maximum period of 90 days from the date of its
registration.
The
second addition to be made here is that every
decision made by the Commission must without -fail mention therein the date of
registration of the concerned Appeal or Complaint, as the case may be, along
with its consecutive serial number.
D. Rule-11
(Communication of the decision)
An
addition to be made here is that every
decision of the Commission should be communicated to the Appellant or
Complainant and as well to the concerned PIO, First Appellate Officer or
representative of the Public Authority within 7days from the date on which such
decision is announced.
Another
addition to be made here is that every
notice or decision to be communicated by the Commission to a Complainant or an
Appellant, as the case may be, shall be made in the regional language Oriya in
addition to the link language English.
5. Low disposal of cases
As per
the information obtained through RTI, on
an average an Information Commissioner in Odisha is disposing only 30 to 35 cases per month, while in contrast Mr.
Sailesh Gandhi the Central Information Commissioner and quite some
Commissioners in other States are disposing 200 to 300 cases per head per
month. Low disposal along with absence of proper hearing by the Commission has
led to a massive pendency of about 7000 cases in the office of the Commission. So, it is recommended to Commission to hear atleast 30 cases per day and dispose
atleast 300 cases per month.
6. Neglect by the Commission towards Section-4
related the cases
Most of
the Public Authorities in the State have not
made voluntary disclosure of information in the manner they should have
under Section 4 of RTI Act. Secondly,
though many public authorities have voluntarily disclosed, it has not been
updated since 3 years. Moreover, the Information Commissioners are
not entertaining the complaints by citizens against the negligent public
authorities who are found violating Section 4 of RTI Act during last 11 years.
Thus the Information Commissioners are not hearing such complaint cases nor
directing the concerned Public Authorities to comply with the said provision of
the Act. So we urge the Commission to hear section-4 related complaint
cases and issue direction as per the
law.
7.
Hearing of the cases through video and audio hearing.
In the era of advancement of Information
Technology and digitalization, the State
Govt. is adopting e-governance system to
make the administration accessable to
the people. The Central Information
Commission is hearing the cases through video- hearing. Earlier, Odisha
Information Commission was hearing the cases through video-conferencing. But it
has been stopped. So we request
Commission to start video-hearing and audio-hearing of the cases of the
complainant/ appellant.
Pradip Pradhan Biswajit
Mohanty
State Convener Core-Committee Member
Odisha Soochana Adhikar Abhijan OSAA
M-9937843482
Sanjukta Panigrahi Srikant Pakal
Core-Committee Member Core-Committee Member
OSAA OSAA
Prakash Samantsinghar
Core-Committee Member
OSAA
