MINISTER OF State for Home Harsh Sanghavi said on Monday that Gujarat could be the first state in India where a praiseworthy attempt is being made to prepare a list of people who are “misusing the Right to Information Act (RTI) in a year.” According to an official release, Sanghavi made the remarks while addressing a seminar on the subject of 'Roles & Responsibility of the Different Stakeholders' organised by the Gujarat State Information Commission on the campus of the National Forensic Science University in Gandhinagar as part of RTI Week celebrations. Every year, RTI Week is celebrated from October 5-12. The release quoted Sanghavi as saying, “Gujarat could be the first state in India where a praiseworthy attempt is being made to prepare a list of people who are misusing RTI in a year. The Gujarat Information Commission has done the work of prohibiting such agents who use the name of RTI. I congratulate the team of Gujarat Information Commission for this best work.” Citing the minister, the release said, “When a legislation is promulgated, some citizens take disadvantage of the same and try to make it a means to earn income. Some RTI activists residing at a distance of 500-1000 km harass industrialists using the name of RTI. There is a network of such gangs in the country. To eliminate this network, the Gujarat government is doing leading work in coordination with all the departments.” The release also said the Surat police has succeeded in arresting 105 persons while registering more than 85 cases against people misusing RTI. Whereas, in Ahmedabad around 12 cases were registered in just 15 days. It said that Gujarat police has started registering cases under Prevention of Antisocial Activities Act (PASA) as well against such criminals. The release added, again quoting Sanghavi, that this Act has been framed in the interest of people and not in the interest of RTI agents. As per the release, Chief Information Commissioner Subhash Soni also spoke on the occasion. He said that in the past five years, in around 500 cases, Public Information Officers have been fined more than Rs 42 lakh. The seminar was also attended by information commissioners Subramaniam Iyer, Manoj Patel, Nikhil Bhatt, Vipul Raval and Bharat Ganatra, among others.
