One year of RTI: Tales of failure

Free flow of information is still a distant dream despite efforts by the government.

Updated on: Oct 11, 2006, 13:52:00 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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In Ahmedabad

The police responded with a threat when Vipul Patel filed an RTI application seeking information on the money collected by the police as penalty. The traffic department told Patel about the money collected over the past two years, but refused to divulge the name of the bank where the amount was deposited.

They suspected his motive and said Patel would be held responsible for any 'untoward' incident.

In Chhattisgarh

An application seeking information about recruitment of teachers on contract basis proved costly for three villagers - Hemlal Verma, Pawan Kumar and Girish Kumar, who wanted to know why candidates with lower marks were given jobs.
The Kasdol block executive officer slapped a bill of Rs 1.02 lakh for a dossier. He charged Rs 100 for a page against the stipulated Re 1.

In Delhi

Even the Prime Minister’s Office had denied information on a RTI application, seeking file notings on the appointment of the Central Information Commissioners.

Almost 10 months after filing the application and two appeals with the CIC, the applicant is yet to get the requisite information.

In Gujarat

An innocuous query by a slum-dweller Madhuben in Ahmedabad irked a municipal corporation official. He sent a henchman to her house, who intimidated her: how dare she seek a reply from a government office.

Madhuben, member of a self-help group, noticed a red mark on her house in Vasna and wanted to know whether her house would be demolished. The municipal corporation refused to answer her query and threatened her with dire consequences instead.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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