rti-supreme court P.I.L.- padyatras

As per newspaper reports the Maharashtra Governor K Sankaranarayanan
has cleared the appointment of Vilas Patil as the state's Chief
Information Commissioner. This means the Governor has Ignored
protests by the RTI activists as well as veteran activist Anna
Hazare .
Chavan's selection is against the SPIRIT of the RTI act 2005 but
going by the words of the act he is defending his unjust decision .
The problem is that the " Spirit of the Act "can only be felt by the
ones whose own spirit is alive .
The Governor is totally wrong when he says this issue is not in his
purview and that the appointments require only a ceremonial sanction
and so he is not too keen on ruffling feathers in the state over it.
Governor's move is againt the spirit of the act .
The preamble of the Act "An Act to provide for setting out the
practical regime of right to information for citizens to secure access
to information under the control of public authorities, in order to
promote transparency and accountability in the working of every public
authority, the constitution of a Central Information Commission and
State Information Commissions and for matters connected therewith or
incidental thereto. " starts with words " Practical Regime ". If the
spirit of the RTI act is to set up a practical regime that breeds and
supports corruption ? of course not . But by selecting the sycophant
yes-man info-commissioners ( taking shelter of words of the act ,
leaving the spirit aside ) , the AGs are setting up a corrupt regime
in the states n the country. The same is being done in Maharashtra .
Chapter IV , Sections 15 , 16 & 17 of the RTI act has it all , even
then none of the AGs are caring . Things are being misinterpreted ,
Why ? Only to have the puppet info-commissions .
The Government should widely advertise the post of Information
Commissioners and give sufficient time and opportunity for submitting
candidatures to a wide cross-section of all those who may be eligible for
the post, all over India and in all walks of life. Moreover there
should be specific criteria of
suitability for the post of Information Commissioners and
that criteria should be used to conduct transparent,
non-discriminatory screening
procedures to select the best among the candidates.
To achieve this Given options may be exercised -
1- Either File a P.I.L. in Supreme Court of India so that AGs should
make such desired rules U/S 27 of the RTI act , or

2-Plan Padyatras of RTI activists starting from all state capitals ,
covering the maximum territory of the state with all activists
joining it enroute in their district headquarters with yatras
culminating in New Delhi at Parliament on 26th January 2011 because
perhaps this issue can and should be addressed by the Parliament. We
have to build
a public opinion through a wide consultative process and thereafter persuade the
Parliament to bring about the necessary amendments in the Right to
Information Act, 2005. In this process we have to seek support of our
local M.P. / M.L.A. as the case may be .

Of course we should include all other frequently discussed issues as
well to strengthen RTI .
--
Urvashi Sharma

RTI Helpmail( Web Based )
aishwaryaj2010@gmail.com

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