It is the responsibility of the head of the institution to appoint people those who are effective public information officers and first appellate authority. The FAA orders are often not transparent, says Bhaskar Prabhu
While the RTI Act allows for penal provision and disciplinary action only against the Public Information Officers (PIO), the State Information Commission (SIC) is looking to tighten the noose around First Appellate Authorities (FAA) as well.
It will recommend disciplinary action to department heads for non-performance of duty under other provisions of RTI Act that empowers commissioners to take all steps to direct public authorities to secure compliance of the RTI Act. FAA not passing detailed orders, not attending hearings is seen as one of the reason for growing appeals.
The round about way of getting to the FAA is to ensure that they do their job well. The state chief information commissioner, Sumit Mullick will be taking a meeting with the first appellate authorities in the September last week or October first week to sound them off about the same. A letter from the commission was already sent to the office of chief secretary and other officials.
The commission feels that in 80% of the cases the first appellate authority does not see through it that the information is given to an applicant, and this results in second appeal. The commission in its letter in June this year had stated that since there is no penal provision against FAA, they often give orders that have no basis and do not even turn up for hearing.
"This is a good order and I appreciate this. It gives a guidance with likely steps if it is not followed," said Shailesh Gandhi, former central information commissioner. Bhaskar Prabhu, RTI activist said, "It is the responsibility of the head of the institution to appoint people those who are effective public information officers and first appellate authority. The FAA orders are often not transparent. If their order is transparent, it is also easy to decide. The Department of Personnel and Training had also said that chain of PIOs should be available. This will help on know who is the PIO at fault if there are transfers and if there are ones who are regular offenders in not providing information."
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