Jammu and Kashmir’s Chief Information Commissioner G R Sufi has complained that the Legislative Assembly is not following the Right to Information Act, according to a report by a newspaper.
The Assembnly has not created a website to make required proactive disclosures, according to a June 8 article in Greater Kashmir by Dr Raja Muzzafar Bhat, an RTI activist and the former convener of the J&K RTI Movement.
In a follow-up report, the newspaper cited “highly placed sources” as saying the information commission wrote to the legislative leaders urging corrective action.
Sufi was quoted as saying, “Yes, I have urged the speaker to intervene and get the RTI Act implemented there.”
Bhat’s article said, “How can our State Information Commission (SIC) blame Government departments, semi -Government organizations, Corporations etc. for not implementing the section 4 (1) (b) of State RTI Act as the law making institution of state where the Right to Information Act (RTI) has been enacted, is itself violating the State RTI Act by not creating its own official website.”
Role of Act Discussed at Conference
Separately, a June 10 article in Authint Mail by Irfan Mahraj reported on a recent conference about the 2009 Jammu and Kashmir RTI act. Activists questioned the utlitity of the act ans also asked whether information is enough to usher a process of accountability in governance.
“Information is not enough. To act on that information is the larger question,” Dr Sheikh Ghulam Rasool, Chairman J&K RTI Movement, said, according to the article.
Filed under: What's New