RIGHT TO INFORMATION


Moneylife Digital Team 23 November 2019
Continuing with its tradition to disregard the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) once again failed to uphold the provisions of the Act and has failed to follow Supreme Court decision on providing information on bank inspection reports.     In a recent...

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While the office of the Chief Justice of India is now a public authority under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, thanks to a historic Supreme Court (SC) order last week, the 108-page judgement also throws up some interesting analysis of this law, particularly by way of clearing up any...

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The argument by the Attorney General of India, KK Venugopal, at the Supreme Court (SC) hearing in September 2019, that the office of Chief Justice of India (CJI) coming under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, “will prove deleterious to the functioning of the judiciary;” was nullified on...

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Despite clear-cut directives by the Supreme Court on 15 February 2019, to the Centre and eight states to make appointments to information commissions in a timely manner and to make transparent the names of the members of the search and selection committees, the agenda and minutes of committee...

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MANOJ PATHAK (IANS) 05 November 2019
At least 13 commissions, boards and corporations in Bihar have not submitted their annual report to the state legislature for several years, an RTI query has revealed.   These commissions and boards have not submitted their report for at least 13 years, the RTI query...

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Thanks to pressure from right to information (RTI) activists, finally, on 25 October 2019, the Indian government notified rules for the appointment of information commissioners.  But predictably, the appointments came with reduced tenure and status, in order that the government can control...

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Last week, we highlighted the alarmingly large numbers of Central and state information commissioners rejecting second appeals to the extent of 87%. This week, we focus on their performances on imposing and executing penalties on public information officers (PIOs) which is pathetic as per the...

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While close to 0.3 million (280,288) appeals and complaints were registered, and a little over two lakh (2,16,354) were disposed, the Central Information Commission (CIC) during the same period returned a whopping 23,791 second appeals out of the 28,174 it received, amounting to over 84%, as...

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As many as 3.2 crore Indians have filed applications since the Right to Information (RTI) Act came into being on 12 October 2005. The Central Information Commission tops in terms of second appeals with 78.94 lakh. However, Maharashtra tops in the number of RTI applications with 61.80...

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Encroachments on hills, hill slopes and flood lines of river banks; cementing of nullahs, small streams and aquifers during construction; absence or wrong design of storm water drains and; plastic litter choking water bodies, has led to a grave situation in Pune, which surfaces as life...

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IANS 07 October 2019
A Right to Information (RTI) activist has allegedly died in police custody in Rajasthan's Barmer after which the district's Superintendent of Police (SP) took disciplinary action against eight of the station's staffers.   SP Sharad Chowdhary said: "Three people including the RTI...

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If more and more citizens conduct inspection of files under Section 4 in the offices of the public authorities, file RTI applications under Section 6 and if activists campaign for Jan Soochna (public information) portals in every State, like the one recently launched in Rajasthan where most...

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Ten years ago, Justice Ravindra Bhat, then a judge in the Delhi High Court upheld a decision by Central Information Commission (CIC) that the office of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) is public authority under the Right to Information (RTI) Act and therefore judges’ assets should be made...

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The trend of central and state public authorities ignoring suo motu disclosures, mandatory under Section 4 of the Right to Information (RTI) Act, dates back to the day of its implementation on 12 October 2005.    Over the years, innumerable memorandums from the Department of Personnel...

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IANS 18 September 2019
The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that non-government organisations (NGOs) substantially financed, whether directly or indirectly, by the appropriate government came within the ambit of 'public authority' under Section 2(h) of the Right to Information Act, 2005.   A Division Bench,...

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Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL) and Electronics Corporation of India Ltd (ECIL) are manufacturers of electronic voting machines (EVMs), voter verified paper trail (VVPAT) units and symbol loading units (SLUs), which have been under the watchful eye of RTI (Right to Information) activists,...

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Akshay Naik 05 September 2019
The High Court of Kerala on Wednesday issued a notice to the Centre on the basis of a petition filed by RTI activist Advocate DB Binu. The petition challenges the powers of the Right to Information (Amendment) Act 2019 stating that the recent amendments violate Articles 14, 19 and 21 of the...

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Moneylife Digital Team 27 August 2019
The Mumbai Traffic Police collected record fines totalling nearly Rs 139 crore in 2018 for violations of traffic rules, according to an RTI filing here on Tuesday.   This figure is much higher compared to the Rs 8.6 crore collected in 2017, said RTI activist Jeetendra Ghadge, and the...

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IANS 26 August 2019
The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to the Centre and state governments on a petition seeking to establish a Right to Information (RTI) portal to enable people to file online applications for information from any department.   A bench headed by Justice N.V. Ramana issued the...

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The flood havoc in Kolhapur and Sangli districts has killed 54 people and thousands of cattle, besides causing colossal loss of property, farmlands and crops.   Was it the ferocity of nature that caused such a great calamity or did human interference aggravate the situation? Right to...

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