Officials upset that replying to 'frivolous queries' posed through RTI applications takes up 10 per cent of their working hours

Right to irritation?

Officials upset that replying to 'frivolous queries' posed through RTI applications takes up 10 per cent of their working hours

Come Monday evening and the Water Works Department (WWD) of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) halts all business on the day so it can give undivided attention to activists who come to seek information on the civic body's functioning. Other departments of the PMC have been similarly occupied since Municipal Commissioner Mahesh Zagade issued a circular a few weeks ago making it compulsory for all departments to devote Monday evenings to this task.

Info without RTI
While Zagade didn't respond despite several calls, Sanjay More, the PMC public information officer, said the initiative was aimed at helping citizens with information without the need for an RTI application.

"The circular puts into effect a direct and timesaving way of responding to queries for information u2014 people can see whatever records they want. Replying to formal RTI applications is a more cumbersome and time-consuming process," explained More.

MiD DAY investigated the RTI process in the civic body, district collectorate and other government offices and found that at least two of 20 working days of a government officer are spent in replying to RTI applications. The PMC received a whopping 6,783 RTI applications last year, more than a 100 applications per department annually.

The least RTI applications that a PMC department received last month were eight. The maximum applications received were 45.

Danger of misuse
Dr R R Pardeshi, acting medical health officer, PMC, whose department receives at least 30 RTI applications in a month, said the RTI Act was a great weapon that uncovered many shortcomings in governance, but it was alsou00a0 susceptible to misuse.u00a0

He said, "It's a double-edged sword. Often we spend considerable time replying to applications that are silly and have no relevance."

Another complaint that officers have is that replying to RTI applications gets difficult because of staff crunch.
"Replying to an RTI isn't simple. We have to go through years of records. When people aren't satisfied, they file repeated RTI applications. New staffers weren't appointed when the Act came into force and it is proving difficult to tackle this extra job with the existing staff," said Pramod Nirbhavne, PMC water department chief.

Uttam Chavan, planning officer, district collector, whose department replies to at least 10 RTIs a month said that another problem was that people appeal against information officers if RTIs are carelessly replied to. "This creates fear too," he said.