Prof Radhamohan: Official Secrets Act has not been repealed even though the RTI act overrides it. Under the Official Secrets Act, if its provisions are violated an official can face rigorous imprisonment from 3 years to 14 years. This hangover is still there in officials’ mind and it will take some time to go. Even now the MLAs and MPs are taking the oath of secrecy of office! This practicality has to be kept in mind while disposing the cases. Moreover reasonable opportunity must be given to everybody before s/he is penalized. According to the Supreme Court’s definition of reasonable opportunity, a person should be given at least two chances to prove his/her innocence before being punished. Initially we found that the government officials are quite ignorant of the provisions of the RTI act. Though under the law ignorance is no excuse, but in reality we found that the PIOs are not very conversant with the provisions leading to the incorrectly dealing with the RTI application. However, once this initial phase of ignorance was over after necessary trainings which were given by the government and the Information Commission, the Commission has even imposed highest penalty of 25,000 to the erring PIOs in several cases. The Commission has decided for giving compensation to the aggrieved citizens, who has suffered loss during the process of seeking information under RTI act and such compensation is to be recovered form the erring public authority. Orissa Commission is the first in the country to take such step. It also took some daring decisions like directing the universities, government colleges and aided colleges to disclose exam papers. After all, the Commissioners are not infallible and they are open to scrutiny. When we say that the role of the Legislature, government and the Judiciary should be scrutinized, why not the role of the Information Commission?

Orissa Diary: Justice delayed is justice denied. The Commission takes about eight months to open the case of appeal or complaint after it is filed by an aggrieved citizen, and takes about five months to one year to dispose the case (as is alleged by some recent studies). What has been the reason for so long delay? Has there been any bottleneck in disposing the cases?

Prof Radhamohan: Initial understanding of the Commission and the government was that not many cases would come to the commission as the PIOs will provide information as per the law. Accordingly, we visualized a small staff structure for the Commission. But our assumption proved wrong. The main reason of delay in disposal of cases is the lack of adequate number of Commissioners and the staff. There has to be at least three Commissioners along with the Chief Information Commissioner, numbering four in total. There is also problem in staff recruitment. A computer operator, who joins the commission on contract basis, effectively gets 2,500 rupees per month. (His monthly package is 3500, but since it is on contract basis the agency which sends them takes some buck). Necessary steps should be taken to bring in adequate and competent staff to man the Commission. But, now due to increasing number of penalties on the PIOs, right signal would go to them to obey the law and provide the information to the citizen due to them. This might reduce the number of cases coming to the Commission.

Orissa Diary: The act clearly say that BPL category of people will not pay any fee for getting information, whereas the state rules exempts them only from paying application fees but not from the cost of information to be provided. Knowing fully well that this provision of the rules is ultra vires, the Commission has not relieved the poor people and give their statutory right. The Commission has also been criticized for not directing the state government to implement the provision of suo muto disclosure under section 4 of the act.

Prof Radhamohan: On BPL case, the Commission has extended the exemption from not only the application fee but to the first and second appeal fees for the BPL category. The Commission has suggested to the government to provide information till 150 rupees (75 pages of information). It is up to the government to accept the recommendations.

Analyze on what are the kind of information a person of BPL category would seek; it would be relating to his/her ration card, IAY and other welfare scheme benefits. These are very small information which would not cost much which would actually burden the BPL person. We are against the misuse of this provision of the act by somebody affluent taking the BPL channel to get information free of cost! Even Aruna Roy and Arvind Kejriwal are against the misuse of this provision.

And on suo motu disclosure issue, it is incorrect to say that the Commission has not pursued. Whenever the Commissioners have gone to any district head quarters, we have first seen whether the district offices have adhered to section 4 of the act or not. The Commissioners have discussed this with the Chief Secretary, who in turn has in turn discussed in various official meetings for follow up.

Major problem will be solved if all the department and offices formulate their work norms.

Orissa Diary: During when Arvind Kejriwal , the national level activist on RTI, visited the state in November 2007, the Commission had imposed penalties only in 19 cases out of about 850 cases disposed, but by today (4th April 2008) the Commission has imposed total number of 61 penalties out of 1175 cases disposed. Is it due to the pressure form the activist?

Prof Radhamohan: There is no such connection of the visit of the activists to the state with the number of penalties imposed. But during this current period some cases which were sure to be penalized have been disposed off.

Orissa Diary: During your stint as the SIC, which have been your best judgments (or initiatives) and what are not so good?

Prof Radhamohan: The first case for the Commission was the case of Ms Kokila Nayak, wife of a late government servant, who had applied for a family pension near the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) since 1994, but did not get the same for last 12 years. She had filed the RTI to know the status of her application, but the PIO said they cannot trace the service record of her husband. The Commission ordered the BMC and the Housing & Urban Development Department (H&UD) to come with the service record and other documents in 10 days, which the said departments adhered. The authorities also settled her case abd got her work done. This was a case of satisfaction for me as the poor hapless women was suffering for no fault of her and was deprived of her due, which was vital for her sustenance.

The decision of directing universities and government and aided colleges to disclose exam papers was a bold and sensitive decision of the IC. The Richa Mishra case (a female student from BJB College who committed suicide for arbitrary evaluation of her paper by the college lecturer) is fresh in everybody’s mind. Teachers felt that they are not accountable. But now they have to be accountable for any arbitrary evaluation of the exam paper. This decision was important as it involves the career of lakhs of students which could well be spoiled due to erratic evaluation.

The RTI camps organized by the Commission in partnership with the NGOs, in 30 districts and six cities of the state in November 2006 where about 60 thousand people visited the camps and about 35 thousand RTI applications were filed, is one of our classic initiatives.

In one case the Commission inadvertently gave a wrong judgment,but we reviewed the case when it came to our notice again and rectified our mistake.

Orissa Diary: From an academician, to environmentalist and social activist, then to a statutory authority, you have made a long journey and variedly contributed to the progress of the state. What more are on cards for the state?

Prof Radhamohan: My present focus will be on three broad areas: environment, gender and human rights. Under environment, forest protection with people’s participation, biodiversity protection, protection of indigenous knowledge and seeds (as against GM seeds), climate change etc will come, whereas under gender, violence against women, education and skill development of women; and under human rights, onslaught of corporate on the livelihood of the tribals and the common people will remain as my areas of concern and action.

Orissa Diary: Thank you very much for cooperating with Orissa Diary.

Prof Radhamohan: Thank you.