Honour the Citizens’ Right !

Let the Citizens’ Exercise their Right Without any Prejudice.

RAMAN SHARMA

Recently, the Jammu and Kashmir State Information Commission in a judgement has advised an information seeker to apprise the commission about the usage of all information he has so far received under the Right to Information Act.

Despite having highest regard and respect for the institute of State Information Commission I beg to differ with the judgement, in the light of the section 6(2) of Jammu and Kashmir Right to Information Act 2009, the order of the commission does not concur with it.

RTI Act is the only law (amongst thousands other laws) in the independence history of India and of course in Jammu and Kashmir as well where the citizens have been put first before the officers /government and where they have been allowed to exercise their right without much formalities and legal technicalities. And it is the only law where a citizen is not required to give any reason for seeking any information from any Public Authority.

The RTI Act was enacted to empower the citizens to bring a practical regime of Transparency and Accountability in the system. The right to seek information should never be seen as a instrument by the citizen to interrupt/interfere in the official procedures of the government but the citizens has the right to know because the government is by them, for and of them so why should they give any reason for seeking information and even after seeking information why should they be compelled to tell anybody that for what purpose they have collected the information. In case of Parliamentarians and State Legislatures, they are also not required to give any specific reason for seeking the information nor they are compelled to tell the parliament or state legislature the usage of such information thereof.  Same way a tax payer; and by the way in India every person is tax payer, whether direct tax or indirect tax (in shape of sales tax etc), has the right to know what the government is doing with his money.

If for instance, for my personal knowledge  which I may not use anywhere, I file an RTI application with the Jammu and Kashmir State Information Commission and wants to know the total number of appeals and complaints the commission has disposed of and in how many cases the commission has imposed penalties on the erring officers,  now should I first tell the commission that for what reason I am seeking the said piece of information or after getting the information should I tell the commission that I gathered that information just for my personal knowledge.

The order of the commission (in case of Ayub Ayan Vs SDM, Tehsildaar,  Mahore) where the RTI Commission has asked the appellant to apprise the commission about the use of information gathered by him is against the basic principle of right to Freedom of Speech and expression. Every citizen has the right to know and this right to know cannot be confined only for few hundred parliamentarians or for government officers alone, the information with the government must be shared suo-moto but when the government itself fails to share the information with the citizens only then they resort to file formal RTI applications along with fees.

The Commission has cited the  preamble of the RTI Act to support its judgement where the appellant/information seeker has been asked to tell the commission about the use of information  gathered under RTI, the commission cannot cite the preamble of the act whereas the question is very well settled with a specific section 6(2) of the Jammu and Kashmir Right to information Act 2009, that states “  An  applicant    making   request   for  information    shall   not  be required  to give any reason  for requesting   the  information   or any other personal  details  except  those  that may  be necessary   for contacting   him”. The Jammu and Kashmir State Information Commission is itself constituted under section 12 of the act and therefore the commission has no power whatsoever to blatantly defy the provisions of the act and it must act within the walls of the stipulated law. The commission before making such order that may put the life of an information seeker under risk must ensure adequate security and guarantee that Commission would take care of security of life of the information seeker, his family and his belongings.

The past record of the Jammu and Kashmir State Information Commission in cases of  complaints of threat to the lives of information seeker has remained unsatisfactory, the commission has failed to ensure a sense of security amongst the information seekers, though it is also true that under the RTI Act the commission has no authority to take care or direct the police authorities to provide security to the whistle blowers but if the commission had shown same passion as it shown in case of Ayub Ayan Vs SDM,Tehsildaar Mahore then for ensuring security of whistle blowers also, the commission would have cited preamble of the RTI Act but it did not referred the preamble . The commission cannot be selective while using the powers under the garb of preamble of the act.

The Commission should also understand that providing information to the citizen is not a charity or donation or aid by the government to the citizens but it is a fundamental right of every citizen to get all the information with the government without any hassle and only that information should be denied which can compromise the national security/integrity or sovereignty of the nation or which is exempted under section 8 and 9 of the Right to Information Act. About Raman Sharma, he is an RTI activist and can be reached [a] jkrtiact@gmail.com.