A Rapid Study based on the Annual Reports of Information Commissions (2011-12) has been made by Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI), New Delhi. Research and Report compiled by Venkatesh Nayak, Amrita Paul & Seema Chaudhary, General Editor is Maja Daruwala.
It is released in October’ 2013. Executive Summary thereof is being produced in parts in this and further next few issues:
I. Availability of the Annual Reports of Information Commissions on Websites Main findings of the study:
• Although in our previous study we had found the Mizoram State Information Commission defaulting over public disclosure of its Annual Reports, it has now uploaded all Annual Reports up to the year 2011-12. Seven State Information Commissions identified in our study last year, namely, those in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh continue to be defaulters in terms of displaying their Annual Reports on their websites. These websites do not contain even a link for ‘Annual Reports’.
• Only Maharashtra State Information Commission has uploaded on its website, its latest Annual Report due, for the calendar year 2012. No other Information Commission has uploaded its latest Annual Report due, for either the calendar year (January – December 2012) or the financial year (April 2012 – March 2013).
• The Central Information Commission and 9 Information Commissions in the States of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Karnataka, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Rajasthan have uploaded their Annual Reports for all the years up to 2011-12. Others have displayed Annual Reports for one year or more but not for the period 2011-13.
• With the exception of the Central Information Commission and the State Information Commissions of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan, all other Information Commissions have published their Annual Reports in English only. Recommendations:
• Publishing Annual Reports in a timely manner at least within six months of the ending of the reporting year must become a priority with all Information Commissions.
• Information Commissions will be able to compile their Annual Reports in a timely manner only if they receive statistical data from all public authorities under their jurisdiction. According to Section 25 (2) of the Central RTI Act and Section 22(2) of the J&K RTI Act, the duty of ensuring reporting of RTI returns from all public authorities lies squarely on the concerned Ministries. Unless they apply pressure on public authorities under their jurisdiction they will not fall in line to submit RTI returns in a timely manner. They must insist filing of RTI returns at least every quarter. The nodal department charged with ensuring the implementation of the RTI law under each appropriate Government, must send frequent reminders to the other Ministries and Department to do their mandated job.
• Even if the RTI returns are not forthcoming from the ministries/departments, Information Commissions have the statutory duty to publish a report of their own activities at least and submit it to the respective Legislatures in order to account for spending the taxpayers’ money. This would provide them the opportunity to publicly name and shame the defaulting public authorities and compel compliance with the reporting requirement under the respective RTI laws.
• At the very minimum, all Annual Reports must be drafted in the official languages used by the appropriate Governments.
