"A further probe revealed that some of Gandhi's office staff were hand in glove with various departments,"
For once Arvind Kejriwal now has the guts to say openly what I have been saying all along. Namely that IC(Shailesh Gandhi)'s registry and especially all those private interns he hires and pays for are corrupt and hand in glove with various undesirable forces. Incidentally I had complained to the CIC about a nice little racket in IC(SG)'s registry whereby "FIRs for cash" was in progress, but as usual no action although it seems to have stopped for the moment.
Anyway who "probed" IC(SG) ??
Sarbajit
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/Info-panel-flayed-over-pending-cases/articleshow/6966074.cms#ixzz15yY2EOM2
A large gathering of RTI activists from across the state and many of its users assembled for a public hearing at the Mehndi Nawab Jung Hall in Paldi to protest against the rising pendency of cases in the information commission. The participants had expressed worries over the neglect of appeals made under RTI with various departments.
The RTI public hearing resounded with vitriol and sloganeering against the Gujarat state information commissioners, who, the activists alleged, had done little to solve the rising pendency of cases in the commission. Many went on to the stage and even obstructed the day's proceedings. The participants were angry because none of the commissioners bothered to attend the public hearing.
Setting the ball rolling was RTI activist and Magsaysay award winner Arvind Kejriwal, who claimed that the very fact that information commissioners have kept themselves away from the hearing was proof that they were guilty of the delay caused. "We had a similar public hearing in Delhi where we invited Shailesh Gandhi, one of the central information commissioner's. Gandhi admitted that he never knew people were so angry with him . Orders issued were not honored by departments, fines imposed were not collected, appeals made to the commission were stashed away. A further probe revealed that some of Gandhi's office staff were hand in glove with various departments," he said.
Likewise, Kejriwal insisted that such 'public hearings' be organized in the presence of information commissioners to iron out differences with the applicants in an amicable way. "We'll lodge a protest before the commission in the coming week," says RTI activist Bharat Jhala.
While giving a flip side view lawyer Mukul Sinha said, "RTI Act was never meant for activists. It's an administrative tool to help the common man access information which he could not have procured via a complex mesh of laws and rules. My biggest grouse with information commissioners is that they have done little in terms of penalizing officers. Instead of imposing hefty fines, the officers' service records should have an adverse remark, only then would they comply with the RTI laws."
The meet also presented Vinod Pandya's RTI application which showed that in the 2009-10, of the 1,631 cases analysed, nearly 697 orders were issued by the Gujarat information commission and that none was honored. "Some 663 RTI applications were rejected on technical or merit grounds, while 204 applications were returned. The pendency of cases was close to 7,100. Between January and August this year 2,380 orders were passed, of these only 27 penalties were imposed.
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