RTI is alive and kicking after 20 years: Let’s curb its misuse

The count of genuine applications cannot be made available, unless some authority lists out good seekers. It is not possible for the Commission of each state or at the Centre, to know those who got answers from PIOs, as they do not go to the second appeal. Thus one should not conclude that RTI is mostly being misused.

Despite the Government and three estates, the RTI can be alive and kicking. There is misuse of RTI in most of the second appeals at the level of the Information Commission, whereas the applicants are seeking useful information, except in contentious cases. It is not correct to strike out the RTI as a right to good governance.

The Tamil Nadu Information Commissioner R Priyakumar had on September 2 observed that an applicant had demonstrated the height of RTI misuse. The Commission condemned self-styled social activist, Varaaki, and called it unruly behavior. He filed eight complaints filed against various public information officers (PIOs).

Two issues in this application a) he was filing repeatedly and b) seeking voluminous RTIs on the same subject. In fact, most of the applicants at second appeal harass and burden Public Information Officers (PIOs) . The actions of the complainant showed a pattern of harassment of PIOs, he added. This pattern evolved generally by applicants with “beating with the RTI” some new expression coined.

In this case the PIO was at the receiving end - additional superintendent of police, Nilgiris district police, for his alleged failure to provide information sought under RTI applications. The RTI application dealt with mineral extraction cases, a list of A, A+, B category criminals with their parentage and current address, cases pending against political leaders, and accidents/deaths caused by hoardings, dog bites, cattle attacks, and drunken driving. It is too heavy to deal with material taking huge time and energy to answer, though honestly I wanted to give.

On August 14, the PIO could not attend the hearing due to Independence Day security duties. The commission acknowledged this and postponed the hearing.

Varaaki started shouting over the adjournment and charged that like always even this favours PIOs,. Claiming that more than 20,000 of his cases were pending, he stormed out of the hall, disrupting proceedings. The Commissioner studied the figures and found that the applicant had filed 557 complaints, of which 226 were against the Nilgiris police. Some of them were adjourned on the basis of his request. It was nothing but unruly behavior of Varaaki.

Like hundreds of PIOs in almost all states in India, they were full-time officers with other duties; such repetitive RTIs obstruct daily governance. Some applicants became full time seekers, as if they had nothing other work. Some seekers are in fact in the public interest, but they tend to become repeated misuse. Filing RTIs across multiple districts raised doubts about genuine intent. Unfortunately, at times, it became a tool for intimidation or disruption.

It does not mean that every applicant who approached the commissioner in the second appeal stage was misusing the RTI. Hundreds of seekers get the information they seek, quite genuinely.

The count of genuine applications cannot be made available, unless some authority lists out good seekers. It is not possible for the Commission of each state or at the Centre, to know those who got answers from PIOs, as they do not go to the second appeal. Thus one should not conclude that RTI is mostly is being misused.

This author (as CIC) while studying the pattern of ‘abuse’ found it difficult to find out the level of use and misuse. Prominent citizen activist Subhash Chandra Agrawal started by posting letters to the media and most of them were published. (Agrawal is an RTI consultant holding Guinness World record for most letters published in newspapers).

He moved the public authorities including the Ministers and sometimes the Prime Minister too. When RTI Act came up in 2005, Agrawal used the power of information from the authorities. Based on his experience, Agrawal asked for some measures to reduce the misuse of RTI.

He has come up before the Commission with a peculiar problem. He received scores of information from different hospitals that he had filed some RTI applications, which he claimed he did not. He says that his name along with his address is being misused by some persons to file fake complaints and RTI requests.

Someone took his name along with details of Rajasthanis working in government hospitals in Delhi. Though the RTI request was not signed, the Rajasthan government had transferred this unsigned RTI application to various hospitals in Delhi. He had a similar problem when there was a fake complaint against an officer working at Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). He also alleged that someone issued legal notice for defamation based on the complaint in his name.

Agrawal narrated his problem as follows:

I have been receiving voluminous information from various hospitals under Government of NCT Delhi on unsigned fake petitions filed under my name addressed to Public Information Officer on Lok Nayak Hospital (Delhi Government) seeking totally irrelevant and high voluminous information about male and female staff-nurses from Rajasthan working in hospitals in Government of NCT Delhi.

Same fake petitioner has also sent unsigned representation to the office of Rajasthan Chief Minister alleging 100 per cent fake certificates/degrees from nursing-staff from Rajasthan, copies of which are said to have been marked to Health Minister (Rajasthan), Health Minister (Delhi), Chief Minister (Delhi), Prime Minister, Lt. Governor (Delhi), Principal Secretary (Department of Health & Family Welfare, Delhi), Vigilance & Anti-Corruption Bureau, Chief Vigilance Officer, and the Vigilance Secretary. The PIO at Lok Nayak Bhawan, who provided voluminous information without collecting copying charges, did not even bother to note that the RTI petition was unsigned. Otherwise also queries could be avoided under various provisions of RTI Act. Rather he also transferred the RTI petition to other hospitals from where also similar irrelevant and highly voluminous information was received which must have involved huge man-hours in compiling the useless information.

He wrote: This one is just one of numerous such fake RTI petitions and representations filed under my name addressed to many public-authorities, from where voluminous replies are received by me without even requiring copying charges adversely affecting my reputation for being a responsible citizen having used RTI Act in larger national and public interest. Most of such fake RTI petitions/representations are targeted against staffer(s)/officer(s) working in the same public-authority where such RTI petitions/representations are filed.

Evidently misuses if being insiders can easily manage to get copies of documents sent at his address. At times, targeted staffers even threaten me for damages in tunes of millions of rupees for ‘loss of their reputation’ which is done by fake petitioners under my name. He said as ‘a responsible citizen having exposed many scams/scandals and improving system through RTI petitions is badly tarnished. Unfortunately, DoPT has not taken any action. Agarwal represented some good suggestions that were also routed to DoPT through www.pgportal.gov.in. He wanted that every RTI petition or representation must be accompanied by ID proof preferably bearing signature of the petitioner. It should not be difficult because now-a-days every person especially those having knowledge about their right to file RTI petition and/or to send representation to government must be having at least some ID proof.

The civil society needs to understand the usage of RTI and curb improper use of transparency.

(The writer is Former Central Information Commissioner, and Professor, School of Law, Mahindra University, Hyderabad)