Andhra Pradesh info commission scores 0, Telangana fares well

Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh, along with Tamil Nadu and Madhya Pradesh, secured a zero for the performance of their information commissioners in terms of responsiveness under the RTI Act. Telangana state, has been adjudged way better, securing 90 per cent for responsiveness.

In a country-wide assessment of information commissions by the Delhi-based Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS) and Centre for Equity Studies (CES), only 13 out of 29 commissions provided full information in response to RTI applications. Based on the assessment for the period January 2016 to October 2017, the Delhi based advocacy groups prepared a report card on the performance of information commissions.

AP did not provide information even on a single parameter that was assessed. The parameters included the number of appeals registered, disposed of, pending, penalties imposed.

Telangana Information Commission (IC) registered 29,318 appeals and complaints during the assessment period and disposed of 20,257. As on October 2017, the backlog at the Telangana state IC stood at 15,578. The estimated time required for disposal of an appeal or a complaint is 1 year and 5 months. The Telangana state IC imposed a total penalty of Rs 10,42,500 in 181 cases.

The report card of the ICs said that the APIC did not respond to any RTI application. A first appeal was filed in each case against the deemed refusal by the commission. None of the first appeals was acknowledged nor was any notice of hearing or order on the appeals given.

Countrywide, 2,76,405 appeals and complaints were registered and 2,14,809 were disposed of by the 23 ICs for whom information was available.

The ICs of AP, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu did not provide information regarding the number of appeals and complaints dealt with by them. This information was also not available on the websites of these six commissions.

“According to the Research Assessment and Analysis Group (RAAG) study 2013, composite AP had earlier ranked one to three across different parameters. Sad to see AP dropping to almost the last position. When we visited the APIC office last month, we noted that no 4(1)(b) boards were displayed in the office, there were no signboards or hoardings near the office, no PIO or APIO had been appointed till date and the office was maintained by a secretary level employee," RTI activist Chakradhar Budha, national committee member of the Delhi based National Campaign for Right to Information, (NCPRI), told this newspaper.

"There were no receipts of acknowledgement.  All the applications and appeals made before the bifurcation of commission are still in Hyderabad.  There is no response to the application filed on May 2. The commission is supposed to respond by June 2 but there is no reply yet,” Mr Budha said.

Though the APIC website is accessible, it is not up to date and the publication of annual reports was stopped after 2013.