After every short interval comes a time when RTI applicants get replies from public authorities that further delay information that they are entitled to get from authorities in a time bound manner.
After every short interval comes a time when RTI applicants get replies from public authorities that further delay information that they are entitled to get from authorities in a time bound manner.
There are another such set of replies that have come to the fore that range from RTI applications not being responded for lack of postal stamps, application transferred from one desk to another but fails to reach the one that has information, application returned as applicant did not provide proper address, too much time taken to transfer application from one desk to another and raising issues of taxes that are not there in the RTI Act.
An application was not responded to because the Mumbai police did not have the postal stamp required to reply. This, when the first option listed for information to be sent to an applicant was email and not by speed post.
"In my case they returned the RTI application saying that the postal address of the Kalyan Dombivali Municipal Corporation is not proper. I had addressed it to the public information officer of the department it was to be sent it to. Never has this happened when RTI application was sent to other authorities," said Sanjay Shirodkar, resident of Pune who claimed that he is not associated with political party.
"There are some others that I have encountered wherein they are putting exemption clauses without giving any reasons. They put an exemption clause and leave it at that. There is no explanation why that applies. Then they have taken over a month to forward an application when the law mandates that it should be done within five days. I blame the information commissioners for this because they need to take tough stand. Most of the times they are satisfied that information was given even if after a long time when the law stipulates that it should be provided in time bound manner," said Shailesh Gandhi, former central information commissioner.
"Such replies only go on to show that the government does not work in the spirit and intent of the RTI Act. Nowhere it is written in the Act that for the first reply applicants are supposed to give postal stamps or its charges. Applicants are paying Rs 10 in advance for that. With respect to email, they need to follow the RTI Act because it said that even for record retention, these have to be scanned before being disposed off," said Bhaskar Prabhu, an RTI activist.
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