Right to Information Workshop – Sept 30^th 2006

 

Buoyed by the tireless work of the RTI leaders on the ground in India, volunteers of Association for India’s Development – College Park chapter organized a Right to Information workshop for the local Indian community of the DC Metro Area at Univ of MD, College Park. The workshop was aimed at creating basic awareness on RTI among the attendees.

The workshop was started with an inspiring video on the RTI campaign in Delhi by Parivartan – one of the leaders of the campaign in India. It was followed by a presentation on RTI that touched upon the various aspects of the act including exclusions and also the bodies responsible for implementing it. How effectively people have taken to it in India was illustrated with a series of incidents from the ground. The audience was enthralled at how RTI was making a difference to every day life like passport, ration card applications, electricity connections, proper roads. They also got to see how the local people got to overthrow a Government order in a particular case. Another perspective of how unresponsive the Government and other departments have been inspite of RTI in some areas was also discussed.

More details on RTI and how it compares with its equivalent in U.S, FOIA (Freedom of Impression Act), were dealt with in the next session. This session also focused on the strengths and weaknesses of RTI and how it would fare going forward. Mr.M.B.Nirmal the Founder and Chairman of Exnora International, shared his views on corruption and RTI and how the act was widely used by his organization in TamilNadu. It was fascinating to listen to him and full credit to him for making it inspite of being unwell. The attendees then participated in a case study on how to actually file a RTI application including all the details that is generally requested. More brainstorming on how effectively RTI can be used going forward and how everybody can participate followed. Several interesting questions were raised and discussed. Concerns were also expressed about the safety of people using RTI on the ground and honest officers and how best to protect them against vested interests. It was widely accepted that RTI can be strengthened only by more people using it and the participants made a promise to educate and inform as many people as they can about RTI.

The workshop was concluded with everybody taking a pledge that they would neither accept nor give bribe and would use RTI instead. Going by how quickly things are getting done on filing a RTI, this would seem a very wise decision indeed!